Magick's Nifty Fanfiction
by Magick Sudomyuu
Summary: A fanfiction containing no particular genre; action, adventure, humour, romance (very little. ::scoff::), and the tinniest bit of mystery. Whatever holds an audience! Thank you, and feedback is always good! Ciao! n_n
1. Can We Say... Loser?

Can We Say.. Loser?  
  
The girl dragged her feet in the dirt angrily, mumbling under her breath the injustice of middle school. She shifted her crimson backpack on her shoulders, keeping an eye out during the passing period for any of her friends. She would be out of here so quickly, if only she could just revert to Pokemon form and zip out of here...   
  
She eagerly skirted the construction area of the school, where work was being done on the overhangs. Lifting her hands to her hair, she whimpered pitifully as the rain soaked through them, drenching her and her hair. Running under the covering of the building, she let out a little sigh of releif and exasperation, knowing her next stop was to be to the F building, where her class next was. Out in the rain. All day.   
  
Still grumbling the injustice of it all, she slowly walked towards the other end of the E building, keeping under cover as children darted the class, hearing the bell sounding their tardiness. It didn't bother her in the slightest, seeing as how she was already failing most of her miserably boring classes anyways.. whining to herself about the rain, she raised her backpack over her head and darted to her next class, running as if her life were on the line. Coincidentally, it was.  
  
She had been in touble more than once, and her grades weren't exactly making history and she literaly flew through the schoolyard, pumping her arms, keeping her eyes all the while on her classroom. It was lit regularly, but it seemed to glow in the dark of the day. Groaning to herself, she whirled past the poles that came so close to breaking her nose on several occasions, and jumped into the room, skidding on the wet floor and landing on her butt, sliding across the room in a terrific display.  
  
She made it into class just as her teacher was handing out worksheets. She stood up, brushing herself off, and smiled prettily at her teacher, coming to stand in front of him. Mr. Benzvie narrowed his eyes, and, inhaling, he set down the papers. "MAGICK!" he bellowed, sending her flying back against the wall. "YOU ARE LATE! YOU LATE! YOU DO DENTENTION TODAY!"  
  
Groaning and struggling to get up, she watched as he turned, red in the face, from the snickering classroom to go back to his seat as the head of the class. The children distributed the rest of the papers, including to the very soggy Magick, who looked at them blankly.   
  
Algebra was scrawled all over the paper, even in directions unimaginable, and she furiously turned the paper in different directions, trying to decipher her teacher's illegible writing. She winced, glaring at it. Strangely enough, if she satred hard enough, she could see a rabbit in the scrawls.  
  
Magick sat down in the seat across from Romeo, a small, wheedling child, and frowned, raising a questioning eyebrow as he looked her way. "How do you do this?" she whispered quietly, and even then, Mr. Benzvie heard her.  
  
"MAGICK! STANDARDS! WRITE!! NOW!"  
  
She slouched in her chair, looking pleadingly at Romeo, who scribbled valiantly away at his paper. These people are such losers, she though, rolling her eyes as staring up at the ceiling, which leaked down on her face. Great. Just great, she thought angrily, crumpling the paper into a tiny ball and drawing a frowning face with fangs on it. Giving another look to Romeo, who grinned at her in the most annoying way possible, she threw the ball at him, then turned away innocently. He grumbled, but was cut short by a look from Mr. Benzvie.  
  
Sighing, she took out her sketchbook. Flipping to a page which she had been working on for several days, she started outlining her picture of her Pichu in ink, which stayed on the surface of the paper, instead of leaking in like it was supposed to. She ran it over her finger, and it produced nothing. "Damnit!" she hissed, touching her finger to her tongue, then trying it again.   
  
The pen exploded. Black ink ran over her desk and clothing as she jerked back in her chair, trying to jump out of it. She tried mopping it up with her black sweater, but it simply slid under it, and leaked further onto her pants. Mr. Benzvie looked at her, narrowed his eyes, and held up a pink slip of paper, symbolizing her referal slip to the dean was eminent. She banged her head on her desk, resting it on the ink, then looked up at the clock through sooty lashes, seeing only three minutes had passed of the period.  
  
Rolling her eyes hopelessly, she collapsed over her desk again. It was only third period. This was not going to be a good day.  
  
***  
  
Stretching out back at her apartment, Magick rested her feet on one chair while she sat on the sofa. Her fuzzy, pastel blue nightgown clung to her, and she lifted an eyebrow. She stared out the window to her one room, seeing a small orange cat winding through the street. All of a sudden, it shifted to her friend, Crash, and she ran to the window eagerly to yell down. She hadn't seen the anthro raichu in at least three years.  
  
She opened her window, watching as Crash gave her a peace sign from below, and stuck her head out to watch the orange cat winding away aimlessly, ticking it's tail in an annoyed fashion. Sighing, Magick stuck her head back in, and collapsed in another chair, the one close to her kitchen set.   
  
Thinking back on it, it had been approxamitely four years since she had been to the Pokemon world, shut out by a force she hardly knew. All her friends in the world had handed her a token as she left, and the one she still wore about her neck was the teleportation key, the only thing that might have still connected her to the Pokemon world. But by now, it surely was out of order, and wouldn't work if she pleaded for her life.  
  
She brought her hand up to the ivory tooth, clasping it fondly as it glowed reasuringly in her hand. Sighing, she looked at the big blotch on her ceiling from the rain, forming even more and dripping onto the end of her nose. Scooting over and setting her glass under it, she stared harder at it, envisioning a ditto. It was hopeless, she would never see her friends again.  
  
I should do something, she thought lackadaisically. It's no good just sitting here..   
  
She moved about, feeling the end of her nightgown against her legs. She wrinkled her nose disdainfully, and shrugged. She wouldn't be going anywhere soon.   
  
The Team Rocket 47 HQ had been destroyed, and she simply remembered it well. Everybody running. Everybody screaming. A couple people dead. Herself? Standing there in shock as she watched her friends fighting off the evil that had arrived. A head, shadowed by her memory, laughed insanely, his mouth wide open as blood ran down his chin. It had been a gruesome end, for some.  
  
Snuffling a bit, Magick closed her deep green eyes, letting her black hair fall forward and over her shoulders. She missed everybody SO badly.. why did luck have to run out for her all the time? It was one thing after another after another..  
  
She scrubbed her face with an arm, frowning. Black ink rubbed off on her arm even more, and she shook her head, clearing it. She stared down at it, remembering what she used to be. Could she ever be out of this rut again? She stared at the tooth, eagerly thinking of what it would be like.  
  
She would have her Pichu back, not in a world where Pokemon was only a myth to the stupid humans of Urth. All her friends would welcome her back with smiles on their faces, and she would never struggle for food, friendship, or shelter again...  
  
A breeze drifted through the room, lighting up her gown's tail, and making her feel very Marilyn Monroe-esk. She shivered, clasping her arms over her chest tightly to prevent the cold again. Joey, Jads, Ira, Luke, Crash, Pidgeot, Dreana, they would all be there. They were probably waiting for her right now. She could just invoke the necklace, and go back..   
  
She could be a mew again, treasured by the whole poplation of the planet as a beautiful mirage that appeared once every so often. Nobody had ever even caught one. The chances of her going back were so slim, but she hoped so much...  
  
The necklace glowed orange, lifting out of her gown and hovering it front of her, still attatched to her by it's string. She stared at it, holding her knuckle up to her chin, and with a tentative movement, she reached out for it, holding her breath. She only had to touch it, say its name, to invoke it..  
  
A scuffling sound came from under her couch, and she whirled immediately. Her eyes wide, hands forming fists, she backed away from it. "Who's there!" she shouted defiantly. "I don't take kindly to peeping toms! Get out here and I'll... I'll.. I swear, I'm not bluffing!"   
  
She turned, grabbing her spoon off the table, where cheese-y plates still stood, her brows lowering over her eyes. She tested it's jabbing movements, and raised it to the light, where it shined. She stepped lightly near the couch, where scuffling came once more.  
  
"Myu!" came the sound from under her couch, and the whole thing shifted with the movement of the thing under it. "Myu! Myu!"  
  
Slowly, Magick crept closer to it, hands out in front of her, testing her spoon slightly, and eyes narrowed. Getting down on her knees, she sat in front of the couch. Lifting the dust ruffle, she peered under it cautiously, only to jump back in shock and amazement. 


	2. SCHLIMEEEE!!

Chapter 2:  
SCHLIMEEEE!!  
  
What stared at her from under the dust ruffle was a pale, terrified, powder blue Slime. "Myuu!" it cried, glaring at her defensively. It slunk back into the corner of the couch, and glared at her.   
  
Magick, meanwhile, was holding her chest, gasping for breath at the shock of having a small, round, squishy thing scaring the living daylights out of her. "YOU STUPID LITTLE-"  
  
The thing stared at her, bringing on the effect of it's absolutely meltingly adorable puppy dog eyes. The thing that only worked on girls. And, unfortunately, it worked on HER... "Aw, I'm sorry," she said, reaching out for it. "I didn't mean to-"  
  
The thing latched onto her arm, sinking it's very in-effective little fangs into her arm. "Myu!"   
  
Magick and the Slime sat there for a moment, then Magick broke out yelling at the top of her lungs while trying to fling the thing off of her. "EVIL! EVIL! EVIL!"  
  
"Myu!! MYUMYU!" the thing squeaked back, fangs still deep in her arm. She finally suceeded in flinging it across the room, where it hit the wall and started to slide down. Magick grabbed her spoon back, and advanced on the small Slime, who cowered in defeat, it's small tail twitching pathetically. She whopped it a good one over the head, and it shrunk from her blow as if electrified. It burst into phony tears, giving her the impression of her actually hurting it.  
  
For Goddess's sake, she thought, as she advanced on it, crouching again. The thing was a living blob of Jell-O, how could it be hurt. "I'm sorry," she said, and saw real fear in it's pathetic little eyes. It scooted up against the wall, it's disadvantage of having no hands or legs coming into play.   
  
"Forgive me?" She asked, offering her un-abused arm. It sniffed her disdainfully, and looked up at her. If possible, it raised a brow.  
  
"Myu." It bounced a moment, deep in thought, and managed its way up onto her arm. She smiled at it, and it blinked at her, unsure of quite what to do; be friends, or bite her nose off.  
  
Fortunately, Magick had a bit of animal charm about her. "You're so adorable," she told it, smiling and tapping it's head. It suffered itself to be patted, still unsure of itself. "Are you a guy or a girl?" she asked, somewhat a rhetorical question. After all, slimes had.. erm.. well... many sexes.  
  
It huffed a moment, and seemed to glow even more blue than it had been. This gave absolutely no indication whatsoever to Magick about it. "Myu."  
  
"Guy?" she asked, perplexed, and scratched a bit behind one of its cat-like ears.  
  
It purred.  
  
"So if you want a name, you need something kawaii," she said, grinning. It gave her a blank look, and she rolled her eyes in mock exasperation. "How about Pi-chan?"  
  
It wrinkled the cartilage that Magick took to be it's nose. "How about Madoki?" Here it bounced happily, meeping little cries up at her. "Madoki it is."  
  
She stared at Madoki, trying to figure out how something she thought was a myth could be something in life, and in truth, rather cute? She poked a finger into his soft flesh, and it bounced back, pressing against her fingernail like a large balloon. Shrugging, she patted his head. "How did you get in here?" she asked softly, and the slime beamed.  
  
It bounced a bit, then hopped down to the floor and looked at the window. "You got in through the window?" Magick asked, and went over to examine it. "You got in while I was looking outside, didn't you?"  
  
The slime bounced proudly.  
  
Magick collected Madoki back up into her arms, stroking his head, much as she would have to a cat. Or a Meowth. That was right! She had been about to go back to the world which she knew so well, to the world where everything was right, nothing went wrong, and life seemed the most blissful of all things in the world.  
  
The necklace began to hover again, and Madoki made a startled "Myu!" as he scooted away from it in disdain. Magick gently touched it with her open index finger, and looked to Madoki. He huddled in the crook of her arm, and she thought about what she would be leaving beind.  
  
School.  
  
An empty apartment.  
  
Sorrow.  
  
All in all, it seemed the right choice to go for. She ran a finger down the tooth, and whispered sullenly, closing her eyes. "Does the falcon fly? Now is the time... the time.. to strike."  
  
Blue, white, and black flew up and around her in a dazzling display of color, blinding her even through her eyelids as she felt herself being lifted, lifted from the world of the ignorant fools to her home. Her REAL home.  
  
She felt wind tearing at her, and she kept a tight grip on herself, to keep from her motion upseting her. Cold clutched at her like an icy grip, ripping at her gut, and her lungs felt as if someone had compressed her fully. Light seemed to come and go, as did unconciousness and conciousness. A terrible pain was in her side, and she finally fell into black..  
  
Something was patting her face. Groaning, she smacked at it. It uttered a wounded yip of terror, and scuttled around to her other side, where it began to poke her in the ribcage. "OW!" she screeched, and sat up immediately. What she saw was Madoki, who sat there with a rather pleased and arrogant smile. She groaned, putting her head into her palm, and shook it. She had forgotten to leave the little pest at home.   
  
She immediately recoiled in horror. Her eye had begun to swell up, and she found herself in a place where dimensions were completely different than what they had been. In fact, she was sitting in a forest. She blinked, and stood slowly, taking in everything around her with a grimace. She WAS home.  
  
Rattata scampered by her, giving her and Madoki odd little glances, and Pidgey weaved in and out of trees together. She blinked again, straining to see in the immense sunlight. The light wavered a moment, and she suddenly saw someone standing over her. Scuttling back, she only saw a dark shadow, silohuetted against the glare.   
  
Magick sheilded her eyes, and continued to look. It was a Mankey, and it sniffed her cautiously. "Oh, it's so GREAT to be home!" she sang, and, grabbing it around the middle, hugged it tightly. The Mankey flailed, and smacked her bad eyes. She yelped, let go, and watched through her watering eyes the small monkey-type running as quickly as it could away from her.  
  
Magick sighed, and looked to Madoki. He had changed as they had left the real world, but not too much.. he just looked a shade darker, that was all. Perhaps he had come down with a disease on the way? It didn't matter much. All she wanted was to find her friends.   
  
Sighing, she set out on her way, and, amazingly enough, she would have been smarter to take a backpack full of food and clothing with her. She was still wearing her night gown. The next thing the entire forest heard might have even burned foilage, had the littler of many species heard it.  
  
"DAMNIT!" 


	3. Do I Know You?

Chapter Three:  
Do I Know You?  
  
Struggling uphill, Madoki bounced happily by Magick's side, seeming to do well enough without sustenance of any sort. Magick however, was leaning on a self-made wood-piece, her hunger knawing at her stomach evilly. Magick was nearly about to punch the little blob of lard.  
  
Magick had a random thought-- if she was truly back in the Pokemon world (which, it seemed to be at this point) she might be able to change her form to a mew once again. Short-haired, black, cute.. it was a chance that not exactly everbody got on an everyday basis.   
  
Concentrating, closing her eyes and letting go of her stick, trying to let herself relax to the emitted extreme. Her body went slack with her relaxation, and Madoki scuttled away from her with an offended "Myu!". She could picture herself, changing shape, like a molded creature, and assuming her former form.  
  
Her hands splayed out in front of her, and only the second's worth of pain seemed an eternity. White light stretched her body parts like taffy, moving her arms and legs with disgusting noises of internal movement. The same white light seemed to surround her as he clothing was absorbed into her skin, mking her the mew she had been once.  
  
Delight flowed through her, and she instantly shot into the air, a good fifty feet from the ground, whirling and dancing happily. She could finally let her past go! She was once again the best of best..  
  
And was falling at an alarming rate.  
  
Flapping her arms wildly and to no avail, she plummeted quickly, only to stop once she had hit, adding insult to her other injuries. Groaning and rolling over, she found herself in her human form once more, obviously unable to keep up the mew form after so long without practice. he had been away for a while now, it wasn't exactly her fault.   
  
Hearing voices from a little whiles away, she immediately propped herself up on her elbows and yelled, "Does anyone have extra clothing?"  
  
Boy, that was stupid, a little voice said in her mind, laughing at her and jeering. Oh, shut up, she replied, and sat up with a gasp of fresh pain in her now incredibly sore muscles. Three girls rounded the corner and stopped dead, staring at her with little meaning in their eyes.  
  
Magick smiled cheerfully, and gritted her teeth at the pain that it caused. She waved a moment, then stood up, brushing her nightgown off. The girls continued to stare at her until she realized that Madoki was sitting on her head. She carefully took him off and stared down at him, and he displayed a nice little array of extremely sharp teeth.   
  
Looking back up at the girls, Magick hastily decided to finish what she had started. "Do you have any clothing?" she asked dryly. Literally. Her mouth felt like cotton, and pain was wakening in her temples. Oh please, oh please, oh please.. just take me out of the sand and dirt and nasty bug-ridden grasses..  
  
One of the girls stared at her oddly, then turned and whispered something to another girl. Stepping forward, she extended her hand and said, "Fi upi dorak Rimlehd?"  
  
Magicks eyes widened. "Total language switch," she whispered confusedly, then shook the girls hand, trying to decipher her words. "Erm, I'm a friend. Friend," she said, and stopped herself from biting the girl's hand off when she squeezed it in a firm grip. I'll firm grip you, she thought nastily, and sent a little shock of electricity down her arm into the girl's hand.  
  
The girl remained unaffected, and seemed rather amused at this. "Mit dibby," she giggled, and turned to her friends. "Ull yink des vorou."  
  
Right, Magick thought. Enough with the foreign language stuff already. Concentrating on speech pathology and how words were formed in the human language, she focused on the girl and then relaxed. "She said something stupid, probably," one of the other girl's said.   
  
Magick's cheeks burned. "Oh, shutup!" she snapped angrily. "Just because you talk some highly sophisticated language I don't understand..." She stopped, as the three looked at her strangely once more. "Um.. hi?"  
  
"Okay, so now that we know you talk human," one girl said. She seemed to be the most aggresive of them all, with bright blue eyes and shining hair that was a shade lighter than black, but was unidentifiable. "What's with your eyes?"  
  
Magick felt them, and looked at the others. Their eyes were significantly larger, and seemed to reflect light much better than her own did. She blinked a couple of times, trying to make them expand. Well, at least I know I'm not on Earth anymore... "I've just come from Earth," she said, looking down embaressedly at her pale blue nightgown.   
  
"Urth?" another girl asked. Her hair seemed to be dyed a bright orange, and it was cropped closely to her slim jawline. She and the other two whispered excitedly for a moment, then the first one, the one with light blonde hair, spoke again, first clearing her throat.  
  
"Urth isn't safe, you know," she said quickly. "We usually have to eradicate all people from there."  
  
Magick's eyes widened. "Uh, no, that's quite alright, I like my body," she said, stepping backwards.   
  
The girl with the blackish hair smiled lightly. "We're not going to kill you," she said haughtily. Then, smiling fully, she took off her backpack and handed Magick some clothing-- a pair of extremely baggy jeans, as she was considerably taller than she, and a small blue tank top.  
  
"Thanks," Magick said, and the three turned their backs as Magick slowly got dressed, first wrapping Madoki's eyes in her nightgown arm.   
  
"So where are you from, on Urth?" asked one of the girls while she was slipping on the tank.   
  
"L.A," Magick replied, and the three turned back around. Carefully unwrapping Madoki, Magick beamed down at him. He 'meeped' at her and hopped onto her shoulder happily, bouncing slightly from his movement.   
  
"Oh," said the girl with orange hair. "Well, if we want to get to know you, we ought to get aqquainted." She stretched out a slender, well-shape hand and pointed to herself and the other two. "My names' Crash, that's Jads, and that's Joey."  
  
Magick's jaw dropped. The unvarnished three stood together, smiling thinly at her. These three were her childhood friends, and the friends she had left behind so long ago.  
  
Joey was the one with the backpack, wearing jeans and a purple shirt, covered by a dark blue jacket. Her long purple hair slung over one shoulder, braided down the middle and short on the end, exactly like Magick's dream in Fushigi Yuugi, Nuriko the Crossdresser. Magick quickly dimissed that though and moved on to see Jads, who wore a bright red shirt with a white stripe across it, lighting in the mid-afternoon sun. Her shorts were covered with paint and dust, looking like the comfortable types that everybody loved. Last but not least was Crash, with the orange hair that was most assuredly not dyed as it glowed slightly. Her eyes, like Joeys and Jads, were blue, and her green tee-shirt extended past her waist and down to her light blue capris.  
  
These were the friends she hadn't seen in so long, and these were the people who had once touched her life, changing her. They weren't some dumb characters on a TV show back in America and Japan who were characterized and compared to by the man named Ash Ketchum with a stupid little Pikachu who ran to his every whim.   
  
There they were.   
  
Alive and well.   
  
Still waiting for her.  
  
Magick stood in awe until Crash stepped forward, breaking the illusion of her slight disorientation. "Are you alright?" she asked gently.  
  
Magick cleared her throat, choking slightly, and said with a blink or two; "Yeah, I'm fine.."  
  
Jads looked worried. She looked to Joey, who shrugged and looked back to her. "Well... what's your name?" she asked, genuinely interested.  
  
They don't know me, Magick thought, as Madoki started to chew on her ear. She lightly grazed his head with her fingertips, and stared at them. "I'm... Magick." 


	4. Connections and Reconnections

Chapter Four:   
Connections and Reconnections  
  
"No way," Jads said, a grin on her face. "You know her too?"  
  
Magick fell over. "It's ME! There's only one of me, though some people mis-spell it and end up confusing me for some sort of rabbit in a top hat with a magician type person standing over me!!"  
  
"It's her," Crash said, laughing. She tossed her head slightly, sending that orange hair that Magick had remembered through the years spinning back over her shoulder.  
  
An awkward silence ensued, and Magick slowly walked up to each one, receiving a hug in turn from each one of them. It felt different to her now than it had before, most assuredly since she was now back in the realm where it was all Big Eyes, Small Mouth. She could already feel her eyes changing back into the large, sequin-like jewels set high in the face. It really did feel rather odd.  
  
"What have you been up to and what is that thing you're holding and where did you go for so long!?" Questions shot at her like cannon-fodder, and Magick most likely would have ducked, were it not regaurded as so rude to do so.  
  
"I've been on Earth, like I said, and this is Madoki. He's a slime, which are in their own sense much like pokemon, 'cept you don't catch 'em, you just grab them. They're durable and non-flammable, sadly enough. I was in school on Earth, which is more boring than you'll ever know, I swear," Magick said rather hurriedly. She was so glad to be back she wouldn't have cared if the scratches on her legs had been huge welts.  
  
"You mean Urth," Joey corrected. She smiled, showing what could have very fairly been judged as a fang. She had changed so much in so little time, and in a completely straight fashion, Magick recognized that they weren't quite such small children any more, and were three very pretty young ladies.  
  
A sudden thought struck Magick as she finally accepted she was back on her home planet. Surprisingly, she felt like an alien. "The HQ... has it been re-built?"  
  
The three girls looked at each other, then broke into laughter. "Of course it has!" Jads exclaimed, eyes full of mirth. "It's been a while since you've been gone, you'll need a tour and everything, won't you?"  
  
"I.. suppose," Magick said reluctantly, looking at the other two as well, who had mischeif in their eyes. "Ok, what's been new and different since I was gone?"  
  
"Everything," Joey said, eyes still shining eeriely. "Anything you can name, we rebuilt, and everything we remodeled became better and better as time went on."  
  
"You mean you re-built everything?" Magick asked, glancing down at Madoki as he started chewing on her shirt. She swatted annoyedly at him, and he recoiled into the crook of her arm, then puffed back up and started chewing on her hand instead.  
  
"Uh-huh... you think we could see your... thing? The Madoki thing?" Crash asked, eyeing Madoki warily.  
  
"Be my absolute guest," Magick said, handing him over. Madoki clung to her valiantly, but ended up in Crash's arms anyway, flailing feebly. Crash blinked down at him as Jads peered over interestedly, and giggled when he bounced.  
  
"Eep!" Madoki squeaked as Crash prodded him with a finger, and bounced back, very rubber-like. Crash gave a startled squeak of her own as she released him, letting him fly towards Jads, who caught him neatly on her head. She peered up at him, and he peered down at her. She smiled sweetly, and it seemed eminent that they would get along fine.  
  
"Away from the subject of the Madoki," Joey said, clearing her throat and snapping everyone out of their reverie, "we should head back towards the HQ and let everyone know who's back. I'm sure it's going to make a difference." Joey looked over at Magick, who blinked and looked down at herself.  
  
She could envision herself as she had been only a little while ago, back when she had lived with the others; a small ,gangly, and uncomfortable child who had often dragged others into her anger or depression.  
  
It was easy to remember, now, being back on the Pokemon planet. She say what had happened in her past, and she stood quite dumbfounded as the wave of memories hit her...  
  
The young man stalked down the hallway, rather pale in a macabre sort of way. His neat, black hair was swept up into a loose braid at his back, and his shadowed eyes cast haunted looks about him as he carefully opened a door and slipped into the room. The door was shut with a soft "snick" behind him, nearing catching the lab coat tail that whipped up in his fast movements.  
  
Surveying what was inside the room, the man swept forward casually.   
  
"Good evening, doctor," a voice said humourlessly from his side.   
  
The doctor recoiled back to the door, peering into the shadows which enveloped his master, or rather, the head doctor behind a secret organization. "Good evening," he said, trying to said as calm as he could, putting the racing fear out of his heart. His master was not a fool, and it was easy for him to sense that his client had fear echoing in the corners of his mind. "I trust you are well."  
  
"Well enough to await the information you have to present," the shadowed figure said. "I am not as patient a man as you think."  
  
"Yes sir, I understand," the doctor said hurriedly. He dug into the lab coat pocket to his side, producing several ripped pieces of paper on a board and a rather chewed on and frayed pen. "Your report."  
  
"Excellent," the shadow purred, his voice rumbling, barely concealing his pleasure in the dealings of the matter. A hand reached out and took the clipboard, showing that the skin was pale and translucent. A rather pregnant pause set up between the two figures as the one read and the other waited, shifting from foot to foot in his anticipation.   
  
"You have yet to fail me," the voice finally said, sounding altogether more than pleased. It seemed that the doctor had gotten by another day without being repremanded, much to the dismay of his colleagues. The hand reached out again, this time to the side, where the notes were placed on a dresser-stand.  
  
The doctor sighed, and the figure slouched in it's chair. The doctor could tell this because of the shifting of materials, and instantly worried for his saviour. "Are you alright?" he asked cautiously, knowing that his head of command had violent fits of rage for no reason in the past. The doctor could still feel the scar that meant the sword had peirced through the side of his cheek and onto his tongue. It gave reason for his cautious ways.  
  
"I am well," the voice responded, somewhat fainter. "Just weak. I will revive once I have had this mission completed, my son." The shifting of materials told the man that the shadow had begun to strive for a sitting position.  
  
The doctor bowed, placing his right hand, to the side, over his heart, then bringing it up to his eye level and nodding. "In your command." He turned to leave, briskly stalking out and assuming once more the position of the beaten and helpless shell of a human being when he was halted by his master clearing his throat.  
  
"Remember, Hiyoki, one mistake. It's all that it takes."  
  
Hiyoki shuddered visibly, and slunk out the room, closing the door behind him. He quickly gave a glance around, then back, and ran as fast as he could from the office that held the dying power that was his master.  
  
***  
  
Hiyoki sat in his bedroom, placing a hand at his temple and looking down at the paper he was composing for passing his tests. There came a soft knock on the door, and he abruptly sat up, bewildered and shocked anyone would be calling at this time of night. The face he saw was that of his close friend, Mazaki.  
  
"You alright?" Mazaki said, leaning against the doorframe with arms crossed. He made quite a stunning figure, wearing a long, orange shirt and long shorts. It hurt the eyes.  
  
"Fine," Hiyoki replied, sighing and putting his knuckles on his temple and going back to work. "Just have to get something done. Studying, you know." Here he raised a brow, still staring at his paper. "Something you should be doing too."  
  
"Yeah," Mazaki replied, coming to stand behind his friend. He leaned down, arms wrapping around Hiyoki and resting his chin on his head. "But you've really got to take a break sometime. All work and no play..."  
  
Hiyoki looked up, and Mazaki, startled, moving his chin and grinned down. "I have work, Mazaki, it's something that can't be avoided."  
  
"Oh please," his friend said, eyes rolling back in his head so that he stared at Hiyoki, eyes white. "Work is everything. You should really have some fun. Fun, do you hear me!"  
  
"Not when I have someone to look up to," Hiyoki replied, and Mazaki's grin fell from his face, hitting the floor and shattering. "And not when you're part of a conspiracy."  
  
"Shut up, will you?!?" Mazaki hissed frantically, letting go of Hiyoki and looking back to the door. "Damnit, Hiyoki! People could be listening! You never know who's involved in these affairs! For all you know, someone from the 47 gang could be a dorm member, you get me?"  
  
"I 'get you' all right," Hiyoki said, bringing a fist up and grazing his friend's chin. "But I don't see how we can get rid of them and have it be all hushed up. Say they know someone big, right? Then the matter gets transferred over, and there, the whole operation blows up in our face. Do you realize that it really doesn't matter if they know we're coming or not?"  
  
"It DOES matter," Mazaki said, giving the man a stern look and crossing his arms again. "Taking over or destroying an organization is something, believe me, especially if that organization wants to be kept quiet, too. There's nothing you can do to stop it, whether you like it or not."  
  
"Well I DON'T like it," his friend responded, giving him an extremely pained look. "You think I LIKE studying? I'd rather be out there just as much as you would, killing and rampaging, but sorry, I've got finals soon!"  
  
Mazaki raised a brow. "I wouldn't call it killing and rampaging. Looting, raping, plundering... much more official that way."  
  
"One way or another, Mazaki-kun, I've got to finish working in here. THEN I can talk to you. Alright?"  
  
"Hiyoki, if I have to drag you away from here and beat you senseless with a large, blunt object, I will do so. But DON'T CALL ME KUN!" Mazaki glared at his friend, then brushed a long strand of dark green hair back from his face. "And besides-"  
  
"If I throw a stick, will you go after it?" Hiyoki said nastily, glaring and turning around in his chair.  
  
Mazaki looked shocked. "I'll hurt you so badly," he said, eyes gleaming and dancing over the desktop. He took a step backwards, then leaned over, putting his palm on Hiyoki's thighs and leaning down. "Just finish. Finish, and then you won't have to worry about me, or the boss, or anything else. We can be together at last and be victorious over this little society."  
  
Hiyoki turned around again, looking down at the paper, which writing's blurred and fuzzed before his eyes. "Fine. Wait for me. I might be a little late."  
  
Mazaki turned on a heel and spun out, moving quickly down the hall and out the corridor and wing. Hiyoki could still hear his boots clacking on the silent flooring of the building when he went back to work, flames dancing in his eyes at the thought of destroying the HQ.  
  
***  
  
"YOI!" called the ultimate being, the sky dark. He shadowed the entire army of his people as they sent out their strongest pokemon and waited the command from the same being that controlled the people about to attack the HQ. The being floated like an unowned type of cloud, dark and ominous beneath his huge, grey cloak.  
  
"ONWARD!" he shouted, laughing gleefully, and the entire army charged forward, bearing their weapons and pokemon to the HQ. Startled, few people stepped out of the small headquarters, and were instantly surmising an instantaneous fate.   
  
"CODE WHITE!" they yelled, heading back for the building as wind started to whip up around the elite troops heading for the building. Pokemon of the winged type were instructed to use missile attacks from afar and on the base of the building, as a building without foundation would fall fastest. The smaller and quickest types of pokemon were told to attack from the sides, using agility and quick attack to shatter windows and therefore cause hazard within the building. Nobody would get out without at least some sort of blood on them.  
  
The first people out of the building were classified easily by the great master as he formed a large ball of energy to throw at the base. The first was Joey Simyuu, the purple mew with the strength of spell-control and brute stength, though delicate in nature. Her weakness lay like most psychic pokemon, and that was to the same type as they. The second, standing near her and even impressive against his own troops, was her boyfriend, Feathers, the Pidgeot boy. His strength lay within his wings and noble height, along with his cunning, but the weakness that surrounded him was his ability to be damaged easily by electricity and the same wings that now beat loftily against the wind, for they could easily be cut off and cause him great pain. The third person out was Luke, who stood by the fourth person, Crash. The two were Raichu's, valued greatly because they had each other to base power off of in specific areas. Luke held within his grasp the astounding ability of great electric powers, and even now his body glowed against the dark day with it's own electrical charges. His girlfriend, Crash, was the one with the smart moves and amazing agility, who could easily carry the current of her boyfriend's powers and attack with the speed she had. The fifth and sixth people out were Jads and Ira, two of the few humans who lived within the HQ walls. Jads was an amazing figure, standing against the wind as it whipped about her, narrowing her eyes and clenching her fists around the pokeballs that she was sure to use wisely and in fair accordance. Ira, her boyfriend, surely braced her, standing strong through the wind, dark eyes surveying the onrushing army coldly. His hands, too, held pokeballs, though slightly stronger than those of Jads. They were splayed between his long fingers, and his dramatic stance prepared him for the slaughter that was sure to ensue. Next, and seventh, was Kaxic, a strong mewtwo type. His dark, silvery hair was long and put back in a braid, flowing in the wind. He stood firmly in front of the building, his prescence denying the army access. His whole body glowed a rich blue with the energy he stored thoughtlessly, and his crossed arms were also his strength, holding that same energy. Last, coming out and being sheltered by the mewtwo, was a small girl, no older than twelve, black hair immediately catching in the wind and being pushed to her side. She held no real power, and was probably going to be the easiest to dispose of. Her name was Magick Sudomyuu.  
  
The seven immediately begin to attack, Joey launching off a large amount of purple energy that smashed into the small creatures sent out by the opposing side. They flew back and into trees and their trainers, dazed from the first outburst of energy. Carrying a large current of bright electricity was Luke, and he channeled it through Crash, who sent it at the flying pokemon and blasted them nearly out of the sky. Feathers leaned back, then threw his hands forward, releasing a whirlwind stronger than that of the wind pressing down on the troops. It, too, rammed into the flying pokemon, and made a sincere dent in the fighting forces. Jads and Ira released pokemon of kin, twin Ninetales. They filed out tremendous fireblasts, letting the fire wash over not only the pokemon, but starting to break into the humans on the other side. They cringed, overthrown, and were incinerated. Magick stood, trembling, behind her saviour, Kaxic, as he uncrossed his arms and delicately folded them into a circle, then released a psyburn that skidded along the ground, then lifted and broke into the ranks of the humans.  
  
The thought that could only be described as evil crossed the dark ones mind as more people emerged from the building. Oh well. They would all be dead soon. The master let his hands fly out the front, and, yelling into the wind with the pain that the energy caused him by ripping into his soul, and it slowly enveloped the people on the opposing side with dark, flat, and evil energy. They crossed their arms in front of their faces, trying to keep the power off them, but it slowly ran around the bubbles that they created and into them, gashing them open in various places and flowing off, only to double back and attack again. The wise one sat back, pleased with his work as he watched the multicoloured bubbles caused by the sheilds each person put up; purple, white, yellow, orange, blue covering three of them, and one small bubble, black, covering the littlest one.   
  
Peering down and around his forces, the great one smiled as the small girl fought her way up agains the energy that kept coming back at all of her allies and herself. It was almost amusing, how she fought, ut she would be the first to tire for her energy loss, and then she would be conquered by the darkness and eradicated. It was a possible idea that the master of all would re-use her, maybe as a re-incarnate, like so much as a puppet would be used. He sighed, then sat back on his own power, keeping himself aloft with little effort. It had been many years since he had been able to flaunt power such as this, and he had built up enough to do so. How good it felt!  
  
Slowly, incredibly slowly, he saw the bubbles flickering in and out of existence. With satisfaction, he saw them dim out of existence, and the people being surrounded by his power were slowly falling. His troops were now sending the people holding firearms forward, and the snipers were coming around from the sides and shooting at them. More people were coming from the inside, fighting back the forces that he had produced and trained for so long. The vengeance would soon be his, he would soon rid the world of the organization which had corrupted so many minds...  
  
But he thought for a moment, becoming reasonably calm in the day which was night, the fighting becoming a quiet noise beneath him. Would he be considered a hero for doing this, and ridding the world of a society which tried to take over the world, stealing what they needed and trusting few? Or would he be an evil man, considered banned from the world forever because he had killed a well-loved, yet quiet society? It puzzled him thoroughly, and he slowly turned to the people below him, once again regaining concious thought about the world below. Feeling even more powerful from the anger that flowed through the battlefield and through his veins, he once again powered a dark mass of energy, raw and untouched before his meddling hands had quarried with it. He shaped a large ball, and sent it once more at the small shapes below. They cringed, and he could very barely hear the voices as he willed himself camoflauged and floated nearer.  
  
"...get her out of here!"  
  
"If we all have to die, then she might be able to live, the youngest!"  
  
"Somebody give her the damned transport!"  
  
A scream. "No, don't!"  
  
"They got to him! Look what they did to him! Somebody get to him, quickly!"  
  
People were now gathering around one of the fallen, still fighting off the invading forces. Joey angrily fought the nearest people, sending them with the inclines of her hand into trees. Feathers had grabbed two men and thrown them off, and now they were still doing acrobatics in the air as they spun off. Luke, Michelle, and Ira were guarding the other side as he floated closer, and they viciously lashed out with whatever means they had. But the one who lay stricken in the middle was Kaxic. Blood trickled from his mouth and from his chest, and he coughed weakly, handing a necklace over to the child. She cried feebly at his side, grasping for his hand as Jads and Crash forced the necklace around her neck and shoved her backwards, yelling at her to leave.  
  
"Go now! NOW! You won't have another chance!! Does the falcon fly? Now is the time to strike!!!"  
  
The little girl was suddenly gone, a portal in her place, and a thing of great beauty. But now, as the portal was closing, the wise man found his place for taking what he needed. Moving up next to the group, becoming normal again, he fired a small band of dark energy at all of them. They were encased in it, crying out as pain, unbeleivable pain wracked their bodies. But the blood was what enticed the master of all.  
  
He moved forward, and the blood was raised to him. He looked over to his most trusted deciphels, Mazaki and Hiyoki, and the two were grim in the firelight, shooting at the building and attacking relentlessly. He drank deeply of it then, as it shaped into a chalice and tipped down his front, feeling the power coursing through him now as he felt he was surrounded by his loyal servants and minions. THIS was the face that had been shadowed by her memory, but it remained so, and it laughed evilly, the fallen ones lying in the pool of blood on the battlefield. It laughed, and it spiralled out over the entire world, chilling the day so that all felt the evil that eminated from that place. The firearms took over the building, and soon it burned, the evil becoming so that the sky became of the darkest black, darker than twighlight...  
  
Magick shuddered. She could remember it all so clearly. Crash looked over to her as she shuddered again. "Are.. did... who lived from the day I left?" she whispered, eyes wide with fear. These people were certainly not from the dead, so she assumed others lived.  
  
"Everyone still lives," Jads said, eyeing her oddly. "Everyone is still alive and well. But come now, we'd pretty much better get back. Everyone'll wonder where we are!"  
  
"Yeah," Joey said, laughing behind her hand. "Wouldn't want to frighten people into thinking we've been consorting with the people from Urth again, would we?"  
  
The three girls stepped in front, leading her back to the new headquarters. They shook their heads happily as they talked and walked, and Magick stepped back behind them, only for a moment. Unbeknownst to the three of them, she wept silently, praising all that was good for the strength and life of her friends. 


	5. Anthro-were? Anthro-there!

Chapter Five:  
Anthro-were? Anthro-there!  
  
Crash was slowly explaining things as the four young girls made their way steadily down the road. "You know how we said we've remodeled and all? You'll be sharing part of a room with either one of us three, or with one of the new members. We've gotten a lot of those, somehow, in the last few months. And I'm not sure about the others, but I'm starting to get suspicious."  
  
"Of course we're suspicious," Joey interrupted, laughing in the way she had that sounded like wind-chimes. "Why shouldn't we be? Not all of them are healthy-looking, and I suppose it's that which is making them particularly noticeable. After all, we've been pretty much empty up until a little while ago. This means all those ones who look like crackheads coming in are probably up to something."  
  
"That's a vile word to use, Joey," Jads sniggered, trying to look as dignified as she could while trying not to laugh. "Don't call them that. After all, they're humans like you, just like you, and don't you forget it!"  
  
Crash looked thoughtful a moment, placing a delicate index finger on her chin. "Actually, I see several things wrong with that statement. First off, crackheads are NOT just like her. After all, the pasty skin, the shadows under the eyes... there's a recognizable difference. And second, remember, not all people present are human."  
  
From beneath Crash's shirt, a faint movement showed, and Madoki scuttled across the road away from her. The long, slender tail synonomous with a Raichu's flickered out for a moment, twitching vivaciously, and then disappeared under the shirt again. "You can never tell when someone might be around," Crash said, giving Magick a toothy smile.  
  
Magick had, up until now, been digesting this information with somewhat of grim satisfaction. After all, in the years she had been gone, she would have had to come back and find out the newest things going on in the HQ. Now she would have to not only greet old friends, but new members, too. It didn't particularly appeal to her to aqquaint herself with "crackheads", as her own experiences had left her somewhat changed in that light.  
  
However, returning to reality, an argument had come about between Joey and Crash. "...too!" Joey said, lowering her brows until they fell over her eyes, hodding them from light.  
  
"Is not!" Crash shot back, eyes narrowing as she crossed her nimble hands over her upper chest.  
  
"Is too!"  
  
"Is not!"  
  
"What is and what isn't?" Magick asked, somewhat confused.  
  
Jads sighed, shaking out her shining hair. "They're at it again. They have some sort of debate going on right now, and that is whether or not Urth was a suitable place for you to stay. After all, they don't even have pokemon there."  
  
Magick sighed as well, nodding slightly. "It's true. Urth isn't a nice place. People there seem to think that Pokemon is only for small children."  
  
"It's not," Jads clarified, looking forward and away from the two bickering. "Pokemon really can depend on what you like, who you are, and I suppose your preferances. I happen to think that people up to and including those who have lived past ages like that of one hundred can still enjoy Pokemon. It can be a hobby to keep them in shape, a challenge to battle them, a family tradition to keep them as pets, or to raise them for a particular type of breed-"  
  
"Or become the greatest master, which I just have to say is fairly possible. 'Specially with me," Joey said, before dissaparating back into her verbal battle with Crash.  
  
"That too," Jads said, acknowledging the fact that she had been interrupted twice now. "But you're saying they don't respect other people's choices, and judge others, even if they don't know what they're like?"  
  
"That pretty much about sums it up," Magick replied faintly, smiling. She stooped over quickly and gathered up Madoki into her arms, halting the Jell-o blob from tripping either one of the bickering two.  
  
"It must be horrible on Urth," Jads said, eyes widening as she looked at Magick. "Nobody respecting anybody else, constant competition... I certainly hope that I never go there!"  
  
"I hope, for your sake, that you don't have to either. Not a pretty place, either. Litter's everywhere, smog, overpopulation... the list goes on. I mean, even in L.A. there are thousands upon thousands upon thousands of people who live there. There's an electrical crisis, even, and they refuse to do anything about it. The President thinks that L.A. should handle it's own problems."  
  
"That's understandable," Jads said. "I mean, the Koffing must be a little bit too heavy in your area, along with the Grimer and Muk. All you need is a couple of type-efficient pokemon and that problem's solved. Just like with the electrical crisis; if somebody bred a Zapdos or something for that specific need, then you could most definitely have lots of power for your state, and many others as well. Why don't they just do that?"  
  
Magick shrugged slightly, causing the baggy shirt to fall even more over the end of her fingers and down her shoulder. "Well, quite simply, we don't even HAVE pokemon on Urth."  
  
Crash and Joey stopped bickering at once. "Are you serious?" squeaked Crash, her eyes growing large.  
  
"Why would I lie about something like that? Of course I'm serious! I had to endure several long years of watching my past fade away into oblivion because I couldn't change into a mew, and the only remotely similar thing I could do was bend a spoon and predict things. I'm not an Alakazam, it's not my job to bend spoons! And my pokeballs had to go to waste somewhere in this world, so I couldn't even see what they LOOKED like in the real world! Plus, the only Pokemon on the planet were on some dumb TV show about a guy named Ash who was a really bad trainer. I think the moral of the story was to show that he was such a loser, people should strive to be better than him. But there were a couple of-"  
  
Magick stopped, covering her mouth and blushing. The other three had stopped moving, and were staring at her quite intently, despite the bright sunlight. Too late had she realized she had been rambling on about nothing in particular.  
  
"Bend a spoon?" asked Joey quizically. "Bend a spoon?" She burst out laughing, closing her eyes and rocking back on her heels. The other three were left in silence, watching her outbreak of mirth somewhat indifferently.   
  
"That's sad, though," Crash said, looking back towards Magick and trying hard not to join in the mirth Joey was in. "There aren't any Pokemon on Urth? Then who does the fighting and patrolling and breeding and battling?"  
  
Magick shrugged, now watching Joey giggle uncontrolably on the ground, holding her stomach and shaking. "Nobody, I guess. Guns are popular as a method of battling, and patrolling is done by the national guard. Breeding doesn't mean a thing, unless you're talking about some type of dog."  
  
"You mean like a Growlithe?" Jads queried politely, now stepping in front of Joey to make sure she wouldn't run into any rocks on the side of the road.   
  
"Pretty much like that, save the fact that they can't shoot fire out of their mouths, and no dog I've ever seen on Earth has stripes like a Growlithe. But yes, in a very faint sort of way, they are connected," Magick commented, now seeing Joey stand up, wipe her eyes once or twice, brush herself off, and begin to clean her glasses on her shirt.  
  
"Bend a spoon," she snickered, shaking her head as she looked down. "Geez, Magick, that's pretty sad." She tossed out her hair, shaking it, then settled the glasses back on the bridge of her nose, peering through them at the other three.  
  
Madoki meeped quietly in Magick's arms, reminding her that he was there. He seemed more purple now, and less solid, then he had when they had first arrived on the planet, but it was hardly something Magick could worry too much about. After all, he WAS a slime...  
  
The four began to walk again, now starting up a slightly inclined road. A thoughtful look came onto Magick's face, and she thought hard for a moment. Then, putting Madoki safely on her shoulder, she asked, "Not to sound nosy or anything, but how exactly is it that you three had come out for a walk at the exact same time that I came back here? I mean... well, you guys had extra clothing and everything, were you expecting me or what?"  
  
Joey sighed, shrugging petitely. "In all truth, we WERE just walking. Myself? I felt some sort of psychic energy headed our way, and thought it best to check it out. Besides, the spare clothing was something even I was surprised that I had. I didn't know it was in there, but then again, when does a girl EVER know what is exactly in her purse?"  
  
Magick considered that for a moment before moving on with her thoughts. "Even though YOU'RE psychic, Joey, what about the other two here?"   
  
"They just came along," Joey said, terminating any hope for Magick discovering why the other two had come. "Besides, Magick, it's not as if I would come alone. Not after what happened so long ago. It could have been another attack."  
  
Magick nodded once more, thinking about what had happened. Strangely enough, the more she thought about it, the more she couldn't figure it out. "And what IS the name of the man who attacked the HQ so long ago?"  
  
Joey, Jads, and Crash exchanged glances before Jads cleared her throat. "We never really found out, but the only name we could think up for him was Thanos." She looked slightly perplexed, shrugging casually. "Why does it matter?"  
  
"Just for my own terms of reference," Magick explained. "I don't mean to sound boring, but I really would like to know what's being going on in the past few years. It's important to understand all the logistics of things before I go into further detail of what I don't know." She sighed, then continued. "And why aren't you surprised about my appearance?"  
  
Joey raised an eyebrow. "We had expected you would be changed if you came back to the Pokemon world, but what do you mean in particular?"  
  
Magick gesticulated wildly to her eyebrow piercings, her ear piercings, and what seemed to be black eyeshadow above her eyes. The darkness that was there was actually her lack not only of sleep, but her poor nutrition as well. "I wonder, what seems different about me to you!?" Madoki managed a startled hiss and bit her ear as she made wild gestures.  
  
Crash shrugged briefly, sighing. "I don't know, did you expect us to make a big to-do about nothing? I think it looks good." She peered over at Magick, raising her eyebrows slightly and smiling. "Besides, I think everyone else who remembers you will care."  
  
Magick sighed, shaking her head. This was turning out to be incredibly boring, as she had now talked about social problems and economic problems on Earth. The next thing she was sure to have arise was the presidency or something to that degree. Fortunately, she saw Joey stop a moment, then take something out of her backpack.  
  
"Nearly there," Joey said, rumaging through it as she twisted it to the front with a great show of acrobatics. Grabbing something out that looked like a chapstick container, she took the cap off and swiped it over her fingers, then put it back in. Noticing Magick looking, she smiled quickly and showed her fingers to the girl. They were glowing ever so slightly, showing a white little aura over her index and middle fingers.  
  
As they came to the top of the now-getting-steeper incline, what Magick saw made her awed. Her eyes opened as she looked carefully to the rebuilt HQ, seeing only what she assumed to be the very upper-most levels of the thing.  
  
It was a pale building, built into the hillside, so that grass came up and around the walls, nearly covering it. It was a good defense trick, so that invading troops would think that the entirety of the thing was there, above ground. Moving forward, she saw it's mass showing very slightly under the hillside, where the grass rippled very slightly. It looked neatly taken care of, though, and approaching a set of metal double-doors, Joey and the other two stopped.  
  
Joey was the one to step forward, placing her fingers in front of what must be a panel, but was something on the side of the wall, obscured from Magick's vision. She ran her hand twice over the panel, and Magick stepped forward to get a closer look. A miniscule device, surrounded by a metal frame, was hung on the wall. It had what looked to be a mapping device, something used in radar, as a red light kept flickering back over the green and black screen. It stopped in the middle, turning orange, and the doors issued a soft hiss as they opened.  
  
"Hermetically sealed shut," Jads and Crash explained at the same time, then looked at each other and giggled. "We don't want any intruders," Jads said, gesturing for Magick to follow Joey's lead and step through the entryway. "And we especially don't want any heat or cold getting in when there's bad weather."  
  
Stepping inside, Magick saw a room very much like the hall of a hotel. She was walking in on the carpet, to her sides were little pictures, those of landscapes, countrysides, beaches... she looked forward, seeing more sets of steel doors, presumably those of the elevators. Magick walked forward with the three others, Crash being the one to touch a small pad right by the elevator. It hummed, and the doors slid open from the sides and into the wall.  
  
The four girls stepped forward (Magick with a look from Jads) and onto the so called elevator. The lift descended, and for minutes on end, the four dropped. Madoki meeped once again, and she saw that he was loosing the compilation that made a slime. His skin was now a light purple, and his ears were beginning to disappear. Worried, she patted over his body to make sure he wasn't deflating (after all, what could hurt a slime?), but found nothing wrong. He beamed up at her silently as the other three stood, arms crossed, waiting for the ride to end.  
  
Finally, with a choppy, thumping noise, the elevator stopped. Magick gave a little sigh of releif, and stepped out with the others to another hall, similar to the first. She groaned, and Jads looked over at her.  
  
"What's wrong?" she asked, walking briskly down the hall.  
  
"Nothing," Magick responded, struggling to keep pace with her. "It just seems so.. repetitive in here."  
  
Joey smiled to her side. "Thing'sll get a lot more interesting when you get to see all your friends again," she commented. She opened yet another door with the touch of a finger, and it slid open to reveal a cafeteria. Refridgerators, humming to the sides, were large and accessible. Tables ran down the length of the room, and it looked tidy enough. Nobody was in here.  
  
"Anyway," Joey once again spoke up, her eyes shining. "You've got to try and get back to being a mew sometime soon, or you'll never be able to again."  
  
"And since when is that?" Crash asked sardonically, marching to Joey's other side.  
  
Joey shot her a mild look. "Since she was on Urth for so long, I'm guessing... this is a plausible guess, mind you... that if she doesn't hone her skill back up to being able to transform, she's never going to be able to again, due to the lack of experience."  
  
"That sounds about right," Jads commented, looking over at Magick. "I can see where you're going to need training. Four years is an awfully long time... "  
  
Magick sighed, shaking her head. It wasn't a thing she liked, to have people debating over whether or not she would be able to switch to mew form again. Of course, that would mean that there were only two other mews in the HQ.  
  
An involuntary shudder passed through Magick. She wouldn't ever want to be human! They were so dull, and could do only the things that the assistance of firearms or technology let them. "Okay, so when do I start my training?"  
  
"Right now," Joey said, stopping. Magick, too, stopped, surprised that it was coming on so quickly. "Try and concentrate, becoming a mew once again. Okay?"  
  
Magick closed her eyes as she had done before, and felt pain richotet throughout her body as the scratches and bruises from before were remembered. She pictured every fibrous hair, every nerve ending, the small, sleek coat...  
  
She felt pain, and yelped in surprise. "Stop!" Joey cried, and with a rush of wind, Magick felt her come to her side. "Stop, Magick! You're killing yourself!" She heard Crash and Jads gasp.  
  
Magick opened her eyes to see that her flesh had turned black, as it was supposed to, but human bone split the seams of her new body. Dark purple blood dripped from the gashes, and she let the air out of her lungs in a rush, glancing down.  
  
"Focus on bone structure! You're forgetting bone structure!" Joey exclaimed, nervously shifting from side to side.  
  
Magick was more than happy to oblige, and slowly felt her bones shrinking, grinding against one another as they did so. Joey shook her head in bemusement, and opened her hand. Specks of white light dropped onto Magick's wounds, closing them somewhat, so that only a scratch was left of each. In due course, she felt her other beatings dissapear, for they were far less major.  
  
Jads sighed with relief. "Oh my gosh," she said, letting out her breath. "Magick, that scared me so much... be careful next time!"  
  
"But at least she's back to her old mewi self!" Crash laughed. It was true. Fur had grown over Magick's entire body, and she was once again the chibi mew with the big ears. She flicked both ears and tail experimentally, and laughed when she discovered she was herself again. It came out in a series of mews, and Crash gave her a stern look.  
  
"Focus on your speech," she said, looking over to the girl. Magick once again obliged, and her tongue took on a different shape in her mouth.  
  
"I know that," she snapped. "I was experimenting." Her voice sounded tinnier, almost as if it had shrunk with her too. She floated, hovering in the air before the other three girls. But where had Madoki gone?  
  
Madoki managed a muffled 'Myu' from under one of the tables, and came out with a piece of bread in his mouth, happily chewing. "Uh-huh," Magick said, eying the blob.  
  
"Now you get to change back," Joey grinned, looking over at Madoki for a moment before focusing on Magick. "And please, try to remember bone structure. Otherwise, you'll be one wrinkly sixteen-year-old."  
  
Magick raied a brow as she shifted herself back to human form, watching as the three others became smaller, then finally her own height. Jads giggled, and Crash rolled her eyes, but for what reason? She looked to Joey, who was sitting in midair with a smirk on her face.  
  
"Well, at least we know you can go human again," she said, "but what about the ears and tail?"  
  
Magick looked down at herself. Her hands were still the midnight black of her mew form, and her tail swished behing her. Her slippers had broken when she had changed, as she now had paws of extreme porportions. And wiggling, more to the top than the side, of her head, were her little black mew ears.  
  
"Oh nooo," she moaned, and willed herself to be all human. Nothing changed.  
  
"Well, at least you'll make a funny impression on the new members," Jads giggled, looking her over. "I'm sure they'll think you're cute!"  
  
"Oh yeah, gotta love the big ears," Magick wailed piteously, slouching. Her tail twitched even more behind her, displaying her anger and disappointment.  
  
"Well, we'd best get going anyway," Crash said, picking up the walk once more to the other side of the cafeteria. Jads followed, but Joey stayed with Magick.  
  
"Don't worry," Joey consoled her as they walked down the hall, stopping where Jads and Crash now stood. "I'm sure within a little bit you'll be able to change into a full human again."  
  
"I suppose," Magick sighed, looking up to the double doors in front of her.  
  
"Cheer up," Jads said, opening one. "At least you're back home."  
  
Inside the set of doors was a brightly lit lounge, where TVs' stood, along with a table for playing Pool and Billiards. There was white-and-beige furniture adorning the room, and to Magick's surprise, there were all her friends.  



	6. The Heart Of Midnight

Chapter Six:  
The Heart Of Midnight  
  
The Great Master swept down his halls furiously, cloak flowing behind him as he moved impatiently further into his keep. Tapestries on the walls, containing bloody pictures being re-animated by the magic of the place, kept still until he had passed them; nobody dared to bother him when he was in such a mood. Not even the inanimate.  
  
He would kill every last one of them.  
  
His cold eyes, hidden by the ever-present hood which he wore, surveyed his keep, rather vexed. His deciphels should have been back by now, the little snake-men which he had all rights to call his minions. They had set out on a mission to be spies into the underground lair of the Team Rocket site. He wanted all information possible on them now, as he had lost to them last time he had fought. It further annoyed him to bring up such a memory, and the cold air about him caused the stones on the walls to glaze with a slight layer of frost.  
  
He would kill every last one of them.  
  
Bringing his hurried pace to a halt and entering a main room, namely the entrance room to his small castle, he paused and waited for his deciphels to return. Assuming a regal position on a stone chair, he rested upon it breifly. Though this rest should have been comforting, it would be nothing like the one he so yearned for; that of death. In some ways, he confused even himself; all his minions would soon be growing out of the stage of being too young to understand their Master's ways, and soon they would be able to handle themselves. Soon they would learn the truth.  
  
He would kill every last one of them.  
  
It wasn't that he didn't want them to follow in his footsteps; he was merely afraid that they would someday overcome im and then they would be the rulers of his land and soon, the entire world on which they lived. But that was not his present concern. He was not undead, so why should he want for the lifeless existence it gave? Despite rumours and talk behind his back, he was not at all what they assumed him to be; a lycanthrope, a vampire, one of the living undead... he preferred to keep it that way. Let his little ones be left in mystery their whole lives. Then they would not be able to protect themselves against him when his wrath finally bore down upon them. And then, smiting the few beings who were left, he, by himself, would rule supreme. Anyone left would die a horribly painful and long-endured death.  
  
He would kill every last one of them.  
  
Resting his head against one of his hands brought up to his cheekbone, he found himself staring at the main set of doors which led into his keep. What had been taking the snake-men so long? Whatever it was, it only caused him to be further irked by their tardiness.  
  
He would kill every last one of them.  
  
Finally, not long from that point, a hissing sound, like gravel upon gravel, emerged from the front of the castle. Had he had a heart, it would have beat, but the Great Master only wanted his information, and nothing more. Moments later, the door opened, and a small, copper-brown head poked out of the opening, looking towards the Master and freezing with fear. The head was neither serpentine nor human, but a warped version of both; the snout turned outwards, yet it had a mouth, and it's eyes were set further to either side than to the middle, as a serpent's should be. That head was soon followed by a gray-green one, and then a rather pretty shade of brown-blue.  
  
"Sssir," the first one started, moving forward and out of the doorway. It's torso was erected upon a serpentine body as well, though it had two arms and hands, though only two fingers and an opposable thumb outstretched from the hand. There were no legs, or anything remotely like legs; just the twisting, coiling lower half of a snake.   
  
"You are late," the Master said, his deep voice harsh and oppressing as he glared at them, tiny points of gold-red light dancing from his eyes.  
  
"Ah, yesss," the serpent said. "Myssself and my brothersss, you sssee, we were nearly dissscovered, and we wisshed not to-"  
  
"SILENCE!" the Great One thundered. "You returned late!" He allowed himself to calm down partially before continuing. "Your oath to me was to fufill my whims as you were directed, and, of thusfar, you have failed to do so with a passion." The Master turned his eyes on the gray-green serpent. "Nahari. Surely you have something to say to your master," he said, then rested them on the brown-blue one, frowning. "Or you, Kiri."  
  
Kiri and Nahari both looked incredibly embarassed by their tardiness, but said nothing. The main snake-man, Polsara, continued. "We were afraid they would ssspot usss, O Great One, may your name caussse pessstilence."  
  
"This does not please me," The Lord said, standing up and unnerving the serpent-man to say anything further. He thoughtfully turned his back on them as they drew nearer, and thought a moment.  
  
The serpents had their way, The Great One knew. One always told the truth, one always told lies, and the third one would speak in nothing but riddles and give neither a false nor true lead. It would have been no hard task to figure out which was which normally, but they would always shift their personalities to further confuse him, and it was hard, often, to tell which was which, for they shifted in neither pattern nor any other type of lead. Putting a hand carefully at his chin, trying to phrase his questions so that they couldn't be avoided any way, whether it was the neutral, good, or bad serpent speaking.  
  
"And you are saying to me that you would have been caught had they seen you? What would they do to you? Torture you?" The Great One turned to them again, his eyes glinting maliciously. "They are not so cruel. And if they were, it would be no hard thing to find another race of creature suited to the task, ones that did not tickle my patientce such as you."  
  
This was in part true. The snakes had dutifully served him over the course of over a year or so, and it would be hard to replace them, though they did irk him so by their trading of positions. It was a common thought of his whether or not the snakes did it deliberately to annoy him, or whether this was truly the way they were. Even at this point, he knew not their race, and could not easily find any others like them.  
  
Nahiri spoke first, his green-tinted skin gleaming by torchlight as he slithered forward, undulating unpleasantly. "They might have," he said quietly, his lisp of his race coming clearly through on even his non-"s" words. Licking his scaled lips, he continued. "And in sssuch, they would have taken no information. Or would they have? Could they have, my Great Lord, may your name caussse fear beyond belief?"  
  
The Lord Of Soon To Be considered this, and made a note that Nahiri would be the one giving the neutral information this day. "You, then, Kiri. Tell me why you are so late. And tell me what happened in that place."  
  
Kiri looked first to Polsara before speaking to his master. "We are late due to the enourmousss tunnelsss that are usssed to get in to the keep, O Lord Of All, may your name caussse plague."  
  
The Great Being frowned, but not visibly, as his serpents shrank once more, to their original size of little more than a foot big. Polsara nodded assent to what Kiri had said, but Nahiri only sat and looked down at the floor, averting his eyes from The Lord's view.  
  
"And then what?" he asked, his anger only growing stronger, and he felt the first waves of pain that came with his power surging through his body.  
  
Kiri evidently noticed the change, for he backed up slightly, undulating his coils in a sinister way as he looked down at them. "We found out nothing, Sssire." He winced, cowering, and held his claws up at his face.  
  
The Lord feigned sorrow at this news, and shook his head. "A pity," he said, stepping back over to the throne and sitting down on it, staring down at the floor.  
  
Kiri was nearly beyond himself with relief when he had seen his Lord sit down, it was obvious to tell it the way he relaxed. But it was not for long.  
  
"Nahiri and Kiri. Come here." The Master said nothing further, only glared at them as he once again stood up, the fire in his eyes growing stronger to only Polsara's view. The other two snake-men were drawing themselves slowly forward, wincing with every curve of stone underneath them. It seemed almost eminent they would be punished for not gaining any information.  
  
Nahiri opened his mouth, hissing hurriedly, "Sssire, pleassse, do not lasssh usss again! 'Twasss painful enough lassst time! Sssire, I beg of you-"  
  
"Hush, shhh," The Great One said, as if comforting some quailing child. "I will not lash you."  
  
Kiri gave a wail of distress. "Sssurely The Massster hasss sssomething elssse more deviousss planned, Nahiri! You fool, you musssn't have reminded him-!"  
  
He, too, was cut short by The Ultimate Being. Polsara remained quiet in the background, silently surveying what his two brothers would suffer for lying. It was he, in fact, who had been the one witholding the true information.  
  
The Master stepped over to where the snake-men were, and smiled down at them. The moonlight glistened off of what couldn't be described fairly as a tooth, but something resembling such. "Come now, I'm not going to punish you. Just giving you a last chance to answer me correctly."  
  
The two brothers looked at each other. Surely they couldn't do such; it was not a routine which they followed by their constant switching of roles in truth and fakery. It was, indeed, an oath that their race must make, and seeing as how there were so make snake-people born into a family, it was each three snakes that were paired up to do such. But of course, The Being knew nothing of this.  
  
"We cannot," Nahiri said hoarsely, and closed his eyes in defeat. "Pleassse, Sssire, do not harm usss! We will make ammendsss-!"  
  
Nahiri was cut short as a large boot was slammed down onto his spine, and he flailed wildly for a moment before collapsing, dead. His eyes rolled up in his head, and a yellow, sap-like blood oozed from his back, where charcoal-grey bone stuck out of it. His ribcage, too, had been crushed, and there had been a sickening sound as it had crunched under The Master's boot.  
  
Polsara and Kiri stared at their fallen brother, but made no sound. They were lucky it had not been them who had suffered the anger of their Master.  
  
"Go. Now. And you will make do for what has happened here. You will be able to serve me just as well, if not more efficiently in the future. GO!" The Lord bellowed at the snakes, and they hissed with fright, sliding for the hall into which they could escape.   
  
Looking down upon the mess that was Nahiri, The Almighty One wiped his boot disgustedly on the snake-man's scales, watching as the body leaked still more fluid onto his stones. It really wasn't a problem at all. Now there would only be two to decipher from, and there would always be one who would tell the truth. But, oh, such a waste of good scales.  
  
The Master sighed, or emulated such a motion, as he lacked lungs with which to produce such a sound. But it was nonetheless a point of him being exasperated. The lights in his eyes died down somewhat, and he kicked the corpse of the snake as he walked down into the hall opposite from which he had originally come.  
  
Climbing stairs, passing many bedrooms, and heading up to one of the utmost highest turrets, The Dark One stopped, collecting his wits about him, looking around. It was a foolish thing for the snakes to have no recorded any information. Stepping out and up, The Sire found himself staring up at the moon. It shone brightly down upon him, the stars around it gleaming with inner beauty. But such matters were not important.  
  
The reason he was so hard-pressed to find information about the base was because of it's inhabitants. The damned little fools had hidden themselves away numerous times, and seemed to multiply more quickly than the corpses that The Being could find to raise from the graves of towns and cities. They seemed not to care about what happened to the dead; the townsfolk only cared long enough to bury them, bid farewells, and never look back again.  
  
Which was a mistake.  
  
Had they bothered to look, all the graves would have shown as empty; no more corpses littered the underground, as they had all been raised as an army to serve The Lord. He had a great many lycanthropes about him, as he did the living undead, but few amoung these were what he most desired to sneak in and kill the base's inhabitants.  
  
Vampires.  
  
The foolish little ants at the base had thought all the newcomers only slightly out of the norm, pale skin not giving them away in the least. It was only amusing now that the great one had the powers and means to get inside. All he needed was the right vampires, the right moment to strike...  
  
He was snapped out of his thoughts by a throaty sound, one that sounded like a rubbing of rocks together, or, to the living's horror, bones.  
  
A skeleton had shuffled up to his Master, wearing armour that had been long since gone, perhaps maybe since the 14th century. It hung loosely on his yellow, scabrous bones, showing all that was inside. A fleshless skull stared out at The Lord from inside a helmet, the visor raised so that tiny red pnpricks of light could be seen from inside of it. It stared at The Lord as if some part of it's human essescance remained, though it's individuality kept through past the afterlife.  
  
"Uhhhrrrr.." the quiet creaking of bones spoke to The Sire. Though the skeleton would have been able to talk, it had been apparently disabled in some war before The Great One had found it. It's lower jaw was gone, and only the top row of teeth were visible through the helmet as well. It hardly mattered, since this distinguished it apart from the other hundred or so skeletons that served The Grand Being.  
  
"Ah. Garag. You seem to have come in on my thinking again. Is that because you have no brain in that hollow skull of yours?" The Lord asked rheotorically, smiling evilly and looking back up to the moon.  
  
"Uhhrrrr," Garag said, and the shifting of dust that rose in the air told The Master that the skeleton had nodded, releasing a small amount of dust from where his spine and head connected.  
  
Skeletons were partly magical, partly just good luck. In this world, however, and unknown to most, it was magic that kept the damned things together. And indeed, they were damned, as they were forced forever to walk the earth, the temptation of the eternal sleep in front of them, but always out of reach. It was nearly impossible for the skeletons to sleep again. But their magic... ah, what wonder!  
  
A transluscent webbing formed over the joints, and that kept them together. Normally, when a skeleton would be able to talk, it would be due to pushing air past the webbing. But also, there was no air to push with, so how was this possible? It was all part of the enchantment of the creatures.  
  
Howsoever, The Great One was in no mood to be amused by the simplicity of the magic on the skeletons. He would have continued pondering this subject had he not heard another soft noise behind him. Unblinkingly, he stated calmly, "Dark Eve, vampire."  
  
Only half-aware of the being behind him, The Lord turned his thoughts back to the sky and the headquarters. Yet, a snarling arose from behind him as a hand roughly grabbed onto his shoulder, trying to spin him around to face the nosferatsu in question. Annoyed, The Sire waved it off with a short burt of psychic energy, and, for good measure, pushed the owner of the arm back as well.  
  
"What're you tryin' to do?" the vampire behind him asked, snarling once again. It finally occured he woud have to turn to face and deal with his little one. Sighing and rotating on the balls of his feet, The Great Being turned to look at his dark child, his spawn.  
  
The creature angrily glared at him, tossing his head casually to remove a strand of brown hair from between his eyes. Dark, brooding eyes peered out from a macabre face, and the dark red fabric of his vampire's trenchcoat glistened with blood in the moon. The Lord Of Soon To Be glared at him, and he felt the creature shy not one inch away from his elder.  
  
"What bothers you so, Zaerenz? You are usually hunting at this point in time. Why have you come back so early?"  
  
Zaerenz glared at his predessescor, and spoke once again in a voice heavily laden with a Welsh accent. "D'you think I haven't been out there already tonite?" Here he motioned towards his trenchcoat. "I've been rather successful in my huntind grounds, 'Da', but in all good ways I mean to say you're takin' your damned sweet time in gettin' on with your plans. I've just back from the base isself, an' I've just got to say that they're down one member."   
  
Zaerenz licked his lips, giving a satisfactory look to the skeleton who had now turned to face him. Motioning to the skeleton and moving his gloved hand up to his mouth, Zaerenz stage-whispered, "D'you think you kin get rid of 'im? Gives me the creeps." Straightening up, he smiled cockily at his elder, crossing arms and tilting his head. "C'mon, 'Da'. You've nothin' to say for yourself?"  
  
The Dark Lord frowned upon this type of behaviour. It was true that this may have been one of his best and most trusted servants, but the young vampire irked him in a way that he felt unnessescary. Which, knowing the boy, it was. "I know you've been out tonite, and for the Goddess's sake, wipe your mouth. Not only is that disgusting, it's frowned upon by society. You want to go swaggering around with blood on your face?"  
  
  
The skeleton thought nothing of this, and simply continued to stand there and stare at the two fleshed beings.  
  
The Sire snarled to himself, and continued maliciously. "I would normally congratulate you on a successful mission to kill someone from the headquarters, but what exactly did you do with the body? Please tell me you didn't leave it there for them to find."  
  
The vampire's grin faded, and he turned, scrubbing vigorously at his mouth. When he turned back around, he looked sideways to the ground and put a hand behind his head, at his neck and smiled sheepishly. "Well, not exaclt,y I... thought mebbe some o' the others woulda taken care of it."  
  
The Lord started trembling with rage as a wave of pain swept through him, and his red eyes flashed angrily. "You WHAT..?" he hissed through clenched teeth.  
  
Zaerenz looked up, placing both hands back over his chest and sneering at his Master. "Oh please, 'Da', I think that someone oughtta have gotten to it by now. and if they find it, they find it. S'no big deal. I mean, really, I just have to say-"  
  
Not the first one that day, Zaerenz was cut short by his elder seizing him up by the neck and shaking him furiously, his other hand at his side and Zaerenz simply lay there. There was little need for him to breathe, though it was still something that helped to keep vampires active, so he glared at his elder from over The Sire's arm, which had shown little through the grey cloak that kept him so secret. The arm was black as midnight, and red, like snakes, entwined down it to the hand itself, which was also covered in grey cloth.   
  
"You ignorant, stupid, annoying, damned little boy! How dare you! You didn't take care of it at ALL?! I WILL MAKE YOU SUF-"  
  
The Dark Lord let go as his whole body shook, and his body was slowly engulfed in a dark light that eminated cold. Zaerenz dropped, landing neatly on booted feet as he rubbed his neck tenderly, watching his father with a grim, frightened expression. The Master held his head, and then he raised his head, the flames in his eyes growing larger. The skeleton reflected nothing but the same battle fever from his master's eyes, and he stood at attention, loosely relaxed because of his bony form.  
  
Zaerenz looked solemnly to the form of his elder, blinking down at it as it slowly stood up, using the skeleton as a balancer. The vampire's pale skin shone in the moonlight, now counter-acting the dried blood on his trenchcoat. The dark light around The Great One's body slowly faded, as did the coal-fire in his eyes, and he glared at his little one as he stood importantly tall above him. "Go. Get rid of the corpse, and take care of your damned buisness at that base. If I ever catch you looking like you have been right now, let me just say that I will make your undead little life an incredibly unpleasant existence. Go. Now."  
  
Zaerenz shook that same strand of hair from between his eyes once more, looking at his elder blandly. "As you wish," he growled gutterally, and slunk off, trenchcoat flaps trailing behind him with an air of annoyance.  
  
The Sire looked at his servant, and the skeleton felt annoyance emenate from his master. "Uhhhhhhhhhhhrrrrrrrr..." he grinded, trying valiantly to reassure him that this was merely a slight annoyance, that things would go his way, but The Dark One only shook his head, motioning with a hand for Garag to follow him down, back into the castle.  
  
As they wound down the stairs leading to the main hall once more, The Great Being thought carefully of what had just happened. That vampire of his was going to create more trouble, no matter what he did to prevent that fact.  
  
"Uhhhrrr..." Garag started once more, but The Sire frowned up at him, which the skeleton's evil eyes saw into the cloak for.   
  
"Do not worry, my good friend. I killed you so long ago for one reason, and that was to make sure you never spoke again," The Dark Lord sad, smiling back up at his minion evilly. "Come now. I will make sure that these stupid creatures will die. All humans are destined to, as are the stupid creatures thay have mutated with. Surely no breed of the two can stop me."  
  
"Uhhhhhhhrrr.."  
  
"No. No, they can't," The Ultimate Being said, smiling even moreso now, triumphantly thinking of his plans as they approached the throne. Skeletons were clambering to his side even now, their bones rattling macabrely as they rushed to aide their master. Lichs crawled out of the darkness, dressed in fine, yet tattered, robes, along with the lycanthropes, dragging assorted oversized limbs along with them. Beside these creatures followed the Dark One's pride, his little ones, all with blank looks on heir faces, those of the undead, and those who lived only to serve their master.  
  
"And I will kill every last one of them," The Heart Of Midnight said, his voice echoing through the hall as he laughed insanely, drawing his creatures to him. As they kept pouring from the halls, the echos of his laughter, accompanied by the grinding of bone, kept the madman safely in his domain of insanity. 


	7. Unaccustomed Relations

Chapter Seven:  
Unaccustomed Relations  
  
Magick was completely shocked by the fact that so many of the old members had stood by Team Rocket Forty-Seven the whole way through, and were now considerably older, looking at her strangely, just like she were some sort of new person; and then and there, it was easy to spot the new people, the quiet, pale people. Madoki hid behind her leg, then reconsidered and hid behind Joey's leg.  
  
Scanning quickly in the crowd, Magick carefully picked out those not paying attention; one of those beings happened to be Luke, who was engaged in a conversation with a pretty young Raichu Femm, closer to his own age than her own. Winding up from behind, she crouched low and waggled her bum in a manner most cats would be proud of.  
  
"I don't think-" Joey started, but it was a bit late, and Magick was off, charging down the limited amount of space towards her friend. Leaping into the air and gaining sufficient altitude, she started to fall just as he looked up. A look of ultimate surprise crossed his face, and he put his hands out just in time to avoid collision of the chins. He was knocked head over heels, and ended up in a somewhat awkward position as Magick crouched on his chest and leered amiably down at him.   
  
"Who the hell're you?" he asked, straining to keep his neck up in such an awkward position. He let it rest against the ground one moment as the Raichu Femm walked over, giggled, shook her head, and then crossed her arms expectantly. Magick could feel the anger radiating from Crash in one moment, and it was gone when the Femm looked up, blanched, and stepped even further away.  
  
Magick sighed, rolling her eyes and getting off him with a disappointed frown tugging at the corners of her mouth. "How many other girls with ears and tail like this pounce you on an everyday basis, huh?" She couldn't resist a jab at his chest as she leaned over and prodded him.  
  
As quickly as she had done so, he had grabbed her hand, thrust her down on to the ground and replaced her standing. Grinning evilly down at her, he closed his eyes. "Yes, definitely the same old Magick. Same old tricks. Same old grabability."  
  
"Is that a word?" Magick heard Jads whisper, and she giggled behind her hand as Luke looked in that direction. With a tug on his still immobile arm, Magick brought herself up on her feet and grinned at him. He blinked at her as she hugged him, and hugged back gladly.  
  
"Good to see you too," he chuckled, grinning as she stood on her tiptoes and swayed.  
  
"I missed you!" she exclaimed into his back, and finally opened her eyes and let go. She looked at him studiously; he had changed so much from the younger man she had known so long ago. It was something she knew would happen over the years, but hadn't really expected of him. It was definitely him, though; there was no mistaking the same sweeping black hair and the self-satisfied smile that crept onto his lips every so often.  
  
Magick looked over her shoulder and looked into the crowd again. It was so full of new members, she could hardly pick out the old members. Two factors got in her way; one was seeing as how all the members had grown older, and while retaining much of the faces she had known so well so long ago, they were elder and looked different. The second factor was that all the new members shuffled mindlessly around, looking blankly up at her while the crowd seemed to form around her and move past. Luke shrugged, and moved to grant her leeway into the sections of the room, striking up a conversation with Crash.  
  
She spotted another person; she was reading a book, sitting in one of the large armchairs, completely preoccupied. Her flaming red hair came in waves down around her face, and she stared intently at the book with large, jade-green eyes. It was distinctly Dreana.  
  
Magick grinned. She slowly slunk over, then tapped Dreana on the head. Dreana looked up slowly, and was immediately hugged by Magick. She choked and coughed, holding her book out to a side to avoid smacking the dark-haired girl. Magick understood her reaction; she had hardly ever interacted with Dreana, though she knew that the woman had exchanged few words with many. However, she smiled, and hugged Magick faintly back, not really wanting to get involved with someone she hardly knew.  
  
"How are you?" Magick asked her, and the woman smiled prettily, black lashes demurely covering her eyes as she looked down.   
  
"Very good. How have you been?" Dreana asked, dulcet voice sounding as she put down her book and set a bookmark in it before closing it and crossing one leg over the other petitely. She looked so formal; it was no wonder that she was admired throughout the HQ.  
  
"Great!" Magick replied, smiling widely. Admiration spread through her warmly as Dreana stood, coming a bit taller than herself and folding her hands neatly together in front of her. "I've missed you all so much! I can't believe you're all here!"  
  
Dreana smiled once again, perfectly white teeth showing as she did so. "We've missed you too. What, with you being gone to Urth and all."  
  
Magick nodded, looking over Dreana's shoulder to see Ira, Jads' boyfriend, standing and chatting with a new member. His black hair was smartly tied back into a ponytail, and he seemed to be studiously thinking as he murmured assents and distresses to the personel. "Mind if I leave?" she asked Dreana, and the woman shook her head, sitting back down into the chair and opening her book once more.  
  
Magick stepped over, then hugged Ira tightly from behind. He, too, had a reaction like Dreana's; it was true that Magick only knew him by his face, and had never interacted with him whatsoever, but she still felt an obligation to hug him. She waved, then moved away, leaving him somewhat confused and somewhat appreciative. Jads looked over, and stepped to him herself. He greeted her in what seemed to be a murmur; everyone was talking that way.  
  
One member looked her way, locking eyes and then turning slightly from her, his face going slack of all emotion. He turned fully from her, almost frightened seeming, and murmured as all the rest were doing by speaking to each other.  
  
Thinking about it, it was slightly disconcerting to hear that; there was no loud talk, laughter, or any of the like; it was all low speaking, as if they were all keeping secrets from one another. She was reminded of an office, and finally went back over to Joey and Crash, frowning.   
  
"Why is everyone so quiet?" she queried in a loud voice, and some conversation halted as people turned to look at her. She blushed and looked at Joey further, not looking at anyone else. Joey shrugged, brushing hair out of her face.  
  
"No clue," she retorted in the same tone, and all conversation halted. The sudden silence was incredibly still disconcerting. Clapping once and grinning to her purple-haired friend, then whirling to the largely assembled crowd of members.  
  
"So! When's dinner?"  
  
***  
  
It was not until after dinner when Magick chose to go off exploring by herself around the base. Darkness was falling, and it was a good time to be warm and safe inside. So, full of the good dinner, she made her way out into the compound itself.   
  
She had spoken with many of the new members during dinner, learning names but quickly forgetting them, catching up with many of the people in the HQ. All except for Kaxic; she hadn't been able to find him, and didn't want to be rude by asking. She learned about three who she kept particularly in mind; Mazaki, a member who looked entirely too much like a gothic wannabe, Nakri, who seemed to be a morph from the energy that Magick had derived of her, and Zae, who wasn't there, but was apparently a cause of suspicion amoung many of the members.  
  
It became slightly muggy as she left the main hall for dinner, like some window somewhere had been opened to let in the warm heat of the outdoors. It was hardly on her mind, though. Where was all the cool stuff? Like the artillery? Big weapons? Fancy bombs? Where was the trademark Rocket stash-o'-goodies?!  
  
She tentatively pushed open a door that seemed to just pop out of nowhere, blinking and looking in cautiously. There seemed to be nothing in it. Maybe a room just for storage they had cleaned out? Or was it a secret hiding place for when they needed the BIG guns? There was only one other thing in it, and that was a large, bay window reaching the ground, along with a balcony, showing the night outside to be displayed as if some dark blue satin had rolled across the sun.  
  
Humming, she strolled right in, head held up high as she looked around, thumping about freely. Banging into a closet door, she opened it, only to find that some resident Spinaraks had found their way in and started building the nasty little webs symbolic with the larger ones used for catching prey. Shrieking and clawing her way out of the closet, she brushed herself off, making annoyed little squeaks of disgust as she brushed herself off furiously, rubbing her arms. "I HATE spiders. . . "  
  
Looking back over to the door as she was trying to make her way out, she found it had closed. Jiggling the door handle, she furiously swore under her breath, placing her foot on the side of the door and pulling with all her might. She flew backwards, and met resistance with someting that was little more yeilding than the wall which she would have slammed into. Large hands gripped her arms near the shoulders, pinning them to her sides, and she heard a voice growl near her ear.   
  
"Going somewhere? So late at night? Young ladies shouldn' be un-escorted, y'know. . ."  
  
Eyes going wide with panic, she shook herself once again, then writhed in rage and terror, tail whipping behind her. She felt a boot slam down on it, pinning it to the floor, and she yelled out loud; that HURT!  
  
"Shush, hussshhh. . ."  
  
Jamming an elbow backwards and trying to yank free, she found only that the hands let her go, letting her make a great show out of fighting to maintain balance once she had done so. Finally managing to whirl in heavy boots, she fought her way around and shoved up the shoulder on her black tank. "The hell-?"  
  
Standing in front of her, hands grotesquely warped and hanging down to his calves, was Zaerenz, his once almost-amiable countenance now smeared with blood and frowning. It made Magick shiver just to see that. Putting her fists up at her face, she yelled at him, "I'm not afraid of you!"  
  
The tremulous tone to her voice only made the beast laugh, and his whole body shook. The shadowed face of his reminded her of the face so long ago, the one that ran with the blood in it's mouth. She took back her stance, crouching in upon herself somewhat.   
  
"Come now," he said, cracking his neck from one side to the next. He took a step forward, and she took one back. "I've just come to kill you. Y'see, v'got it all figured out. . . I kill you. . . and see, then they think y'ave gone back to Urth. That place. And they accept it, movin' on, no problem. It all works out fer me."  
  
Magick looked highly offended, then started thinking to herself. If she could only get him close enough, she would be able to do something. She started building up energy in her hand. Just trying to keep him talking would be hard, as he seemed to be one of those creatures of few words, more killing than anything else.  
  
"And how'd you get. . . I mean, in, who do you work for, aren't you going to tell me any of your diobolical schemes before you kill me?!" Magick squeaked, trying to keep him busy, but he still advanced, slowly swinging the tremendous claws.  
  
"I'm not telling you anything, love," he said, laughing slightly under his breath. "I don't see the need, what with you goin' to be dead and all."  
  
Magick stepped as close as possible to the door. "Not even a hint?" she queried, the energy nearing peak.  
  
"None," Zae said, and finally stepped so close she could see the blood on his face; still fresh, still warm. And it reeked of death, of all the horrible things she could have imagined for this moment, yet the energy was ready, and she decided on a dime what to do.  
  
Winding up her arm, keeping it slightly slack, she swung with all her force at his face. A sharp *CRACK!* resounded through the room as she connected with his slim jaw.  
  
He stood with his head slightly angled from the force for a moment, then straightened up and started laughing. His whole body shook once more as he put his hands on his hips and laughed at her, eyes blazing. "Thas' not goin' ta do it, love!"  
  
Magick had little choice left at this point, and simply burst into tears. "I don't w-want to die. . ." she sobbed, not controlling her emotions at all. She felt like a small child, but she simply sunk to her knees and sobbed into her hands, covering her entire face as her body shook. "Please don't kill me. . ."  
  
Zae paused, his eye twitching. This was a perfect opportunity to slice her head off; it would be an easy movement, and then he would have taken care of another member. This just didn't feel right, however. She seemed like just a little girl. Was it ethically right to do something like this?  
  
Magick looked out of her hands, wiping away her tears to see him standing there in confusion, sneering down at her. He was surely no sort of soft-hearted fool. It was his decision now that led her life in one direction or the other, and there were only two choices.   
  
There was another pause of silence as she hiccoughed and looked up at him through constantly blurring tears. There was a cocenetic heat between them, where she tried to perceive all she could about him; his history, what his intentions were, but she was repelled by a strange sense of hatred and cold. So much COLD.  
  
There was nothing between them, no psychic link, no special bond, no personal history, nothing. So, shrugging it off, Zae stepped forward and lunged at her. His claws stretched as he swiped at her face first; the idea was to blind her, and while she was clawing at her face, he would kill her by ramming the hard spikes through her body.  
  
It was an instantaneous reaction Magick had not expected as he lunged towards her, but she hopped onto the balls of her feet and propelled forward. She touched his chest, then bounced off, moving past his claws as they retracted and aimed once more for her.   
  
She was now clear of his first range, but she had little idea on actually how long they could grow, or how much damage they did; whether they were poisonous, or burned, or would strike with electricity. Yet she was now in a perfect place to start excercising her powers of prowess once more. Lunging for him, she sparked an Ember from her palm onto his clothing and stepped back and around him.  
  
Magick had to hand it to the fellow. He wasn't a fool, patting out the fire that had started to spark on his clothing with only a small, quick movement. He spun around, claws whipping out with a loosely braced bone fixture. It was almost a sure thing that if he hit her now, she would go through the wall. So, taking a stupid risk, she threw herself at the ground and lay there, panting. Her back was now the the window, while his to the door.  
  
He took no pauses though, and brought his claws heavily down onto the floor only inches from her face, lining them to look like some sort of cage. She backed up, not wanting her nose chopped off, but he was now behind her. So, consequently, she had backed right into him. Letting out a cry of shock, she moved forward again, growing her own nails out for a Slash attack, but it was nearly impossible to break through those nails.  
  
Zae picked her up easily. She was hardly worth it, to go through this little excercise. It actually was quite fun. He held her by the back of her shirt, and she struggled, choking in the air as she was lifted to his eye level, a good half foot higher than her.   
  
"Ready?" he asked cynically. "If it's this easy to kill alla you, I shouldn't have a problem."  
  
Magick frowned at him, then hung her head, accepting her eminent fate.  
  
Zae paused once again. Ethics and morals came about in his mind. This was altogether too easy; he should have attacked them when they were a bit more ready for such an assault. At this point, he could most likely take over the entire base, if they were all this weak.  
  
Magick peered up at him once more, and there was the same contemplative stare on his face as before, where he frowned and winced, looking at her. It didn't give her any more sense of security then what had taken place earlier.  
  
It was not until she heard a muffled slobbering noise below her. She saw the beast snap out of his trance and look down as well. What could be making such a ludicrous noise?  
  
It turned out to be a ditto, chewing on his boots. She raised an eyebrow, and the leviathan similarly did so. The ditto continued chewing intently, focusing on the leather in front of him. A small puddle was forming from it's wasted efforts, and it was actually somewhat amusing, despite the obvious situation at hand.  
  
Magick looked back up the beast, who shook the ditto off with little more than an effortless kick. It was sent across the room, sliding on the floor, which gave it much more leeway to the ice rink effect.  
  
Zae finally looked back up at Magick, then, giving her an angry glare, he set her down gently. "I'm not after you, love," he spat angrily, and turned from her. She cautiously watched him; it was an instinct to keep her eyes on him. After all, he had just had her in a life-or-death situation. She glared at him, putting up a barrier in defense, but he just shook his head.  
  
"I personally don' think you people are worth it anymore. . . after watchin' you, you're just not that interestin'." He stretched, his claws reverting to normal hands. Grinning evilly at her, he bowed elegantly, taking her hand in his. "Pleasure. Really. Hope to battle you again, when you think you're worth it."  
  
"Worth it!" she spluttered angrily, the tears on her face reminding her of how childish she had acted in front of an enemy. "I can take you on any day! You want to fight again, I'll fight!" She struck a Mantis pose, bringing back two striking fingers and balancing on her back leg. It occured to her she probably should have put in actual fighting tactics before she had even gotten involved with this particular fellow.  
  
Stepping to the window, he opened the bay window doors and stepped out onto the landing. Looking up, he raised his eyebrows and turned back to her, and with a smirk of satisfaction, he made a small wave with one hand and stepped off the platform.  
  
Magick immediately rushed over. "Come back, you coward!" If he was anthropomorphic, he would have had to change before doing something like that, and if he wasn't, he had just condemned himself to a painful death on the cliff. Looking out over the platform, she saw nothing below, and nothing above. It was strange, how he had just seemed to disappear like that. . .  
  
Frowning, she slipped back inside the room, going over to the ditto that lay against the wall. It looked up at her, and immediately smiled in recognition. It didn't quite look like a ditto. In fact, it looked too well-formed to be a ditto. It looked rather much like...  
  
"Myu!" it cried, and squished up to her, happily purring.  
  
Magick's lower lip trembled with recognition. "M-Madoki?" she whispered, and looked down at him with a sniff. "You poor thing!" she cried. "You must've gotten turned into a ditto because there's no such type other than you on this planet! Poor Madoki," she sniffed, and hugged him close. Indeed, it had to be him, for he had the same consistancy as a slime normally did.  
  
A sudden twisting of the door handle brought her back to her senses, and she blinked, looking up in surprise as the door opened. A young man, older than Magick remembered him stepped through, closing the door behind him once more. Silver hair hung in his face; white skin shone eerie in the moonlight. However, there was no doubting who he was at all.  
  
"K-kaxic. . ?"  
  
Kaxic smiled, leaning down o her and offering a hand. "Magick," he said, his soft voice echoing through the room and flowing out the open window behind her. She took his hand, one hand still clutched tightly around Madoki, and was helped up. She stood motionless for a moment, just looking at him, until she rushed him and hugged him tightly, burying her face in his lather jacket.   
  
"Kaxic! It's been so long, how are you, how have you-- I mean, you're all right, nothing. . . I don't understand, but you're alive, you're still alive!" she cried in a jumble, and Kaxic did nothing but hold her, looking bemusedly down at the small girl who had once been so much smaller than he, so much more fragile, and so much more healthy than she was.  
  
"Luck, and help," he replying quietly. "My friends were able to come to my aide. Joey and Jads most of all. They helped me with life support and much more. Both gave blood, along with many others of the enemy side, however unwilling."  
  
It was a sentance that shocked her somewhat, and she had not thought until then how he had gotten in. "They're wonderful people," she whispered, looking up and him and letting go, holding Madoki in both arms and hugging him to her chest.   
  
He nodded, saying nothing more as he looked out the window, being slightly toussled by the wind coming in from the window. He narrowed his eyes, then put his hands in his pockets and looked back at her. "C'mon. We should get back to the others."  
  
Magick nodded, slightly numbed by her reception from him. He seemed somehow changed, and somehow different from who and what she last knew him to be. Shrugging it off, she took up his arm as she walked with him to the door, wondering about him and what had happened. He opened the door emotionlessly, then smiled down at her once more, and they stepped out, back into the HQ, no one knowing about what had just happened.  
  
***  
  
Magick tossed in her sleep, holding the pillow tightly to her as she winced, growling low within her throat. Her dream was rocking her wildly in what appeared to be reality, and she kept seeing her dream as if it were narrated to her.  
  
She was a sort of high nobility. . . it seemed strangely like she had known this dream before. . .  
  
There was a princess who lived in a high tower each day of her desolate life. She was kept there by an evil queen, who wished her to never know anybody or do anything. So day after day, she longed to be in the outside world, which was displayed to her from a balcony with a rail. A gargoyle was perched on the side of it, and each day she spoke to it.  
  
It was her only friend.  
  
She spoke of how she longed to fly away, of how she would be free someday, and how she would die if she tried, for the curse that bound her to the castle was the same curse that would kill her should she try to leave. However, it was only under her own will; should the queen decide to take her out for the day, she would be bound the the queen.  
  
Only with another's help could she free herself.  
  
The gargoyle's inanimate stone heart was touched by the girl's true words, and the heart that she freely gave to it. The queen saw this, and was enraged.  
  
When the princess was in her room asleep, the queen came out and touched the gargoyle, giving it life. There was but one catch; the gargoyle, too, was bound to the tower, despite it's wings and huge, leap-worthy claws.  
  
The princess could ask for no better friend. The gargoyle spoke with her every day, telling her of the years it had spent and the things he had seen. She listened, and would always smile at his heartfelt, loving stories. But what she did not know was that the gargoyle's love had grown for her, and his compassion was wrought in the same stone he was made of, though inanimate. He felt compassion for her sad dream of always being to able to fly away from the castle.  
  
He vowed to her finally that he would get her out. He told her to climb on his back, and he would fly her away from the castle. She asked him if he told her true, and he nodded. He would have given his life for her.  
  
With tears in her eyes and on her face, the princess boarded the gargoyle's back, and with a tremendous crunch, the gargoyle lifted up and away from the castle, his back legs left there to crumble to dust.  
  
He flew her to a safe part in a nearby forest, and flitted down, only to shatter and crumble upon impat with the ground. The princess was heartbroken. The gargoyle had been her only friend for as long as she could remember, and now he was gone. She tried to put him back together, but could not, but found something, instead, in the rocks.  
  
There lay Kaxic, crumpled, dead.  
  
She woke up with a scream, panting as her forehead was beaded with sweat. She choked, holding onto her covers as Madoki hopped up and patted her arm gently. She burst into tears, holding onto Madoki and sobbing. Only one came to comfort her, and through it all, she never saw his face, but knew that the dead man was live, and had risen to help her.  



	8. When Darkness Ensues

Chapter Eight:  
When Darkness Ensues  
  
The Master once again roamed the halls, aware of very little in his tremulous mood. His thoughts were scattered after being informed one of his children had gone missing again, presumably to the headquarters. Without permission.   
  
There was no way into the keep without going through the main doors, the inhabitants were well aware. Any other way of getting in was dangerous to one's health. Electrocution and fire were The Great One's specialties. And he was very, very good with them. However, he would have been slightly amused had his child chosen to take that way in, supposing he forgot the restrictions on the keeps' towers an battlements.  
  
The main doors creaked slightly, then burst open with a force hidden behind them. Zae came striding quickly towards his father, who turne with a hidden, amused expression on his face. The vampire marched straight up the steps to him, stopped barely an inch from his face, and swung out huge claws to grasp his fathers' front.  
  
"You bastard," he spat, hissing. "You sent me in to a place wheh' they've got little ta no protection against us. I don' CARE if tha's the place we're supposed to be goin' and gettin' rid of, I don' think it's fair!" He shook his Master to emphasize his thoughts, but The Dark Lord simply remained calm, and sent his son backwards with a flick of his wrist. Zae toppled backwards over the steps, not having good enough balance to support him on the narrow ledges. His wings sprung out from his back in surprise, and when he did regain balance, he glared at his father from under a lowered brow.  
  
"If anyone should be mad," he started, hands behind his back and starting down one step at a time, "it should be me. You contumaciously went there again, just to kill." Step. "You realize you could have been caught." Step. "Again." Step. "And in doing so, you also endangered Mazaki, Columbine, and Darake." Step. "You also could have killed someone, arousing suspicion once more, when firm suspicion is in your favour to begin with." Step. "You are not as inconspicuous as you think yourself to be." Step. "You are not an invincible being, however much you think THAT to be true."  
  
He had reached the bottom, close to his child. Zae stood tall, claws extending further to protect himself. He realized the small mistake of upsetting his father, which shouldn't have bothered him as much as it did, yet The Shadowed King came closer to him, black robes draping over to consume any flesh that should have shown. Leaning close, he put his face next to his son's, whispering;  
  
"I'm... about... to prove that."  
  
Zae's eyes widened as he took a step back, claws defensively rising against his father. But The Great One simply turned back around. There was not one good feeling about this.  
  
"Not very loyal, are you? You certainly haven't proven yourself to be," he said, not moving. The vampire cocked his head slightly, stepping back into a defenseless position.  
  
"I am," he retorted somewhat haughtily. "I have been loyal to you, 'Da'. I've followed orders before. Will you really let one ickle mistake get in the way?" His voice was now taking a somewhat frightened edge, as he was well aware of what his father could do.  
  
"What ONE?!?" The Hooded Being shrieked, and whirled, his arm reaching out with a psychic force that once again sent the younger of the two beings reeling backwards. "ONE mistake I could have forgiven," he started, walking briskly towards where his son was somewhat dazed from the power. "This You're stupid enough to get caught, and ONCE is all it takes!" He sent another attack, which the vampire was slightly prepared to take this time. He braced against it, claws covering his face in a crossed pattern. Wave after wave of the attacks continued, until the being finally lowered his arm. Thankful, Zae sighed and dropped to his knees, shaking his head to clear it. His wings suffered little to no damage, though slightly tattered now, the silken web of material hurt by the attacks.  
  
"You think I'm through?" The Master questioned innocently, his voice so soothing that Zae was sure it was a hoax. He thinly smiled, unseen, and further walked to his child, leaning down and smiling. "I'll tell you this, my child. Vampires are meant to live twice. You've lived once. This was your last chance. Am I not correct?"  
  
Zae's eyes were shocked. He shuffled backwards, standing in time with his father and looking horrified. "What are.. "  
  
The Great One tilted his head quizzically, almost comically, and looked at his son. "'What are' what?"  
  
Zae shook his head firmly, and stood up tall, wings drawn closely to his back. "What are you trying to say?" he hissed furiously through clenched teeth. The Master's surprise came not from his sons' boldness to stand, or even the fact that he was still obstinately defiant, but from the fact that the power within his own child was growing moreso with each moment.   
  
"What I'm trying to say," he said lazily, "is that if you plan to continue like this, then I do not wish to keep you."  
  
"You sound as if I'm your pet," Zae spat angrily, literally doing so, at the floor near his father's feet.  
  
"... Which you are," The Great One said calmly. Obviously, his torrent of rage had passed quickly. He was now cooling down, and apparently waiting for the rejection of this calm side from his son. The vampire just shrugged, and started walking the opposite direction.  
  
"Where do you go when something like this happens?" The Master called after him, laughingly. The boy was foolish. He would go to the headquarters, as The Shadowed Being had planned all along, join them, eventually get caught, and die in a foolish manner. It had all been known from the start.  
  
The vampire hunched his shoulders, turning back around with a wide smile that caused The Dark Lord to frown instantaneously. He wasn't the child that was so easily persuaded after death, now, not so grateful for the life that had been renewed, and not as gullible as before. His grin was razor sharp, and The Great One saw fangs protrude over his sons' lower lip.   
  
"Where do I go? Oh, I don' know, but I'll tell you this much; I'll be back to kill you some day. Count on it."  
  
Zae then started a slow walk out the hall, moving slowly with his head facing upwards, towards the large, luminescant moon. The Master was infuriated, just as he knew the bo was seeking to make him be. "Zaerenz! Come back here, NOW!" he yelled, not thinking of anything more impressive to say on such a short notice. This was one of his most powerful, just getting up and walking out the door after being subtlely humiliated.  
  
Zae continued to walk, boots sounding on the cobblestones long after he had moved out of the sight of the castle's doors. The Shadowed Being growled within his thin throat, then roared, throwing himself upon the throne of stone and ripping into it with his powers. It sliced to one side, then the other, falling to rubble at his feet. He was immediately calm once more, and briskly strode to one of the side doors leading to a different chamber.   
  
Upon opening one of the main doors, he heard a rattling of bones and the clatter of them upon the cobblestones. He became slightly vexed with this discovery; most likely one of his minions had been listening in on him. He only needed to find the right child at this point. Mayhap he could appoint whomever was behind the door to go find the child for him.  
  
He scooted in past the doorway, only to find that Garag was bowed on skeletal hands and kneecaps on the floor right in back of the door. He helped the skeleton up, sighing at the light body of the magical creature. The skeleton made no attempt to brush itself off, but simply stood, staring at his master expectantly.  
  
"Did you listen in on me?" he asked his skeleton minion, who shook it's head, loose dust in the back of his skull falling to the floor in dissent. Sighing, or making an effort to do so, The Heart Of Midnight strode past with his skeleton following.  
  
"Uhhhrrrr..." Garag groaned, sounding even more creaky than normal.  
  
"My son just disobeyed me and left," The Master mused, half to himself, half to the responsive undead. "He's going to get himself killed, the stupid fool." He smirked, drawn lips pursing then in distaste as he swept through corridors.   
  
Polsara and Kiri suddenly loomed out of the darkness, their scales glittering ominously in the torchlight. The Great One stopped, paused, looking at them. They were in their enlarged form, but shrank when they saw him. Slithering out of his way, they hissed and bowed,one hand crossing to envelop the opposite shoulder.  
  
"Sssire," Polsara began, but stopped short when The Sire stretched out a hand. On it was the same brown-blue scales belonging to Nahiri, yet the scales were formed and linked as a glove around his hand, moving all the way up to cover the elbow area as well. Polsara choked out a strangled cry, backing up so far that his entire body was nearly flat against the wall. His eyes were wide and terrified, yet Kiri nodded slightly and slithered to collect his brother and move the opposite way that The Master was going.  
  
The Shadowed Being nodded with a respectable amount of pleasure at the numb reaction he had received from one of them. It would be no trouble to replace them if they did nothing but gape at him, and did not gain required information. He wold simply have to go to another means of direct spying.  
  
He was now fast approaching the one tower he knew belonged to one specific of his children; Sehnsucht. The child was a highly trained German vampire, having been so even before he had gotten to the dead body. The vampire's master had been long since defeated, and amazingly, the child did not go with him in his death, so instead came to The Supreme Being. He gladly took the child in as one of his own.  
  
He took the small flight of stairs up to the child, smiling as he did so. Sehnsucht would most likely be reading now, like a studious child. That was one of the best traits; the child either was reading and gaining more information on tactics and other such, or was out and about, helping The Great One. Truly a loyal servant.  
  
The chamber loomed ahead; like most of the seperate rooms' doors, the inscription on the room read "Morte", or "death". It was a feature he rather liked, and he didn't bother to knock on the door before clicking down the lock on the gargoyle handle. He was allowed whenever and wherever he wished.  
  
Sehnsucht was crouching next to a lantern, reading a book and curled up carefully, so as to not be burned by the spitting liquid. Licking a thumb, she turned a page before noticing her father stood in the doorway. Snapping to attention and onto her feet, she saluted. "Yes, Sire."  
  
The Great One smiled. "I need you to go out after Zae. He needs a bit of convincing to stay here with his father. He doesn't seem to want to, and it's unfair of him to do so." He put a childlike quality to his tone, which made the young-seeming girl frown in worry.  
  
"You can count on me, " she said smartly, taking up a weapon and growling as she fit it onto her hand. The iron knuckles did add a nice compliment to her outfit, and she looked almost normal; a small trenchcoat covered her pale skin, dark grey in colour, nearing black, while a short shirt rode up on her midsection and baggy pants gave compliment to her choker.  
  
Ah, yes. Her choker. One of the most deadly weapons; it was a cheap, black, plastic thing, with a white platic cross on the front. A small Jewish star lay inside of that, and inside that was a small, indefinitely small needle. The needle held a poinon which was far more deadly than any others known to the human race, and the girl had somehow gained enough to restock her supply when she ran out.   
  
The Great Being pointed out the window to her room, smiling under his hood. "He went East," he told her, and Sehnsucht obligingly faced her window and clambered out it, hopping down onto the ledge and looking out into a tree-laden countryside. Her hair blew softly across her face with the night wind, and she then sprouted wings rather carelessly, not heeding the pain that The Master knew was always there with transformation and warping of the body. He smiled after her.  
  
"Bring him back," he said, and shew jumped from the ledge flying out into the night.  
  
Garag shifted beside him, assuring The Shadowed Being that he was still there. He turned, looking at the skeleton, and said nothing, only nodded, and moved back out the door. Sehnsucht would find the boy for him. After all, she had found how many others that had escaped? He had lost count. But never, never had she lost a single one.  
  
***  
  
Sensucht stared out into the night after landing. She brushed a small strand of hair from her face, where it otherwise would have gotten in her eyes. She remembered all too well cutting that very same hair, so that one side was cropped to her head, with only a few dozen hanging from that side of the head, while the other side grew long and reached somewhere on her shoulderblade length. She had done it to prove she would always be true to her Master; she was completely enthralled with all the vampires that resided within the stronghold, but most of all Hiyoki, a young man who seemed too wrapped up in his studies to pay notice to her.  
  
The main reason she was so enthralled was the overwhelming desire to be just like them; what her Master did not know of her was that she was hardly vampire, more a succbus than anything, but blood was good enough to satiate her hunger in the night. She needn't ever tell him. He would still go along prasing her for jobs well done, and would most definitely never find out, unless one of her good friends lied and told him.   
  
The particular friend of hers who she loved more than anything else and treasured was Columbine; she wasn't a vampire like the rest, but instead had been given another chance to lie. The girl was injected with a serum that allowed her to remain an anthropomorphic what-were-they-again... oh yes. Pokemon. She was able to stay a rat-like one of them, and the Rocket headquarters had taken her in as just another innocent denizen, no problems, and no questions asked.   
  
"Zae," she hissed, her accent having mostly dissapeared over all the years she had worked for the Master; if her count was right, it was somewhere nearing the twenty-three-twenty-fours. That wasn't bad at all, considering this new domination idea of his was solely based on the past four or so years.  
  
Rubbing a tense back muscle, she let her wings drop to her sides as she paused over one space in the forest, where she heard a faint sound of light wind. It was unnatural, and carried the stench of death on it. She was sure it had to be Zaerenz.  
  
Wasting no time, she followed the downdraft and slunk closer to where she knew he must be, fanning his wings slightly to keep him under the cover of the trees, yet high enough to not disturb the brush and therefore lead anyone to him. But Sehnsucht was a bit too clever to fall for something so easily, especially after reading those books...  
  
She picked herself up with the strength of her own wings and followed Zae. He was no doubt close. At once, she found him, beating his wings slowly to keep himself aloft. He cast slightly nervous glances over his shoulder every so often, but did nothing more. He seemed relaxed enough.  
  
Sehnsucht picked a time when he had just looked ove rhis shoulder, moving between the intervals he set and landing with a soft thud onto the sodden earth. At this noise Zae spun, knocking her against a tree and pinning her there with his large claws.  
  
"Sehn," he muttered, eyes glaring red. "'Da' sent you out, din' he."  
  
Sehnsucht glared back at him, having no need for air, yet still finding it inconvinient to be pinned to the trunk of a massive tree. She reached up, then slammed down on his claw with her iron knuckles, continuing to do so until he let her drop wordlessly.  
  
"Yeah, he did," the demoness scowled, tenderly rubbing her pale neck. "He wants you to come back, and if you don't, I'll have to bring you back by force."  
  
Zae snorted, crossing the hands that were now vaguely human-like over his chest. "I doubt it," he snarled, sneering so that his sharp teeth shone in the moonlight. "Nobody kin get ME t'go back there. That bastard's crazier than you."  
  
Sehn made a little exclamation of surprise and annoyance. Here was one of her step-brothers calling her crazy. She sighed, mocking turning her back in defeat, and whipped out her weapon. The chain scythe whistled through the air only inches from his face, and he grunte din surprise, stepping back, arms uncrossing. Sehnsucht grabbed the wodden handle and let the blade come to rest in her hand comfortably. Glaring at him, she snarled.  
  
"Take that back. I'm not crazy."  
  
"Like hell you're not!" he exclaimed, looking at the sharp blade of the scythe that had come mere moments from coming in contact with his face. "You are to own something like that," he continued, eyeing her weapon with satisfaction, "and I really don' want 'a have to hurt you. You're not th only one with toys."  
  
Sehnsucht smiled nastily, showing off her own razor sharp teeth. "Well then, I suppose you'll just have to come back, now won't you?"  
  
Zae shook his head in mock pity. "I din' want it t'ever come t'this," he said slowly. "But if I got t'kill you t'get away, I'll do that. After all. You're dead already, what good would it do t'hurt you more?" He smiled at her, showing one fang over his lower lip.   
  
Sehnsucht released her frozen position of anger and stood straight, blinking in surprise. She paused for a moment, then swung at him with the scythe again. "Shut up!" she raged, glaringly mad at him. He simply dodged this time, making no show of effort as he stuck his hand sinto his pockets and tilted his head at her. "And stop doing that!" she hissed, now seething with rage. He was simply avoiding her attacks, not being serious with her in any way.  
  
He dodged her latest blow with a quick sidestep, and finally shook his head. "Oh, stop," he murmured, and smacked the scythe out of her hand with a blow from one of his claws. "I don' know where I'm goin', but I don' want YOU hangin' on my every step." He smiled once more, and with a little bow, hands back in pockets, turned and walked in the direction he was already facing.  
  
Sehn was left speechless behind him. She picked up her scythe, looked down at it, then back up at him. With a growl in the back of her throat, she turned it into a scream instantly, charging him with the scythe. He turned slightly, then moved to a side and casually tossed her with a flick of his wrist. She screamed again, diving at him and hacking.   
  
"DIE, YOU BASTARD!" she screamed. "I'LL BRING YOUR DEAD BODY WITH ME TO HELL!"  
  
Zae shook his head, and with a cluck of admiration and sympathy, swatted out with his huge claws and hit her upside the head. She flew back, landing against a tree, and the bones brittle with death inside her crunched on impact. The back of her skull felt the imprint of the trunk, and she glared at him as she came to a rest on the forest floor. Loathing swept through her as she looked for her scythe, not finding it anywhere as Zae turned once more.  
  
Calmly getting up from her position, she followed him long enough to wait for him to turn around and smirk, then punched his face with her iron knuckles. His head flew backwards, and he fell slightly. Triumphantly, she laughed... only to then be swept from her knees down onto the floor. She landed with a shocked exclamation, and felt a foot crush her into the soil.  
  
"Stay down there. You belong there."  
  
The foot in her back ground her in solidly, and she felt her upper body go tense with pain. It suddenly released, and she heard soft crunches to assure the elder vampire was moving away.  
  
Bastard, she thought silently, clenching the soil with both hands. I'll get you, you bastard...  
  
***  
  
The Cold Heart looked to Garag, who peered back at him silently. The Master shrugged nonchalantly, and stepped back from the window. "Not a bad display of power," he mused to his skeletal advisor, who simply followed him.  
  
"Sehnsucht obviously must have failed. I'll have to send another out after that foolish son of mine." He pursed his lips in distaste. "Malkavia?"  
  
A mist coalesced behind him, the slight figure's head bent down. "Ai."  
  
"Follow Zaerenz. See you bring him back to me without hurting him... too much."  
  
Malkavia stood straight up; her long, gangly features were accented by her jester's outfit, and the dark eyeshadow around her eyes. The arms twined together, placing one at her chin and the other wrapped around it, her frown counterbalanced by the dark lipstick that fell on her pouting coutenance. "Count on me, Boss," she said, and with a roll of her head, she disappeared back into the mist.   
  
The Dark One had slight more faith in this particular childe; she had never been out and about, but just her power alone should be enough to overcome the stubborn vampire-boy.  
  
"Come now," The Great One said to the skeleton, and the rattling, bony body shuffled slowly after his Master's bidding.  
  
The skeleton had no brain; he thought of hardly anything, and when he did, the effort was so great that it took him longer than he cared to think for. He had suffered many years at The Great One's side, serving him as a loyal guard and a careful advisor. It was his Master who had first removed his lower jawbone, keeping him silent for the thousands of years he had lived for. However, it took hardly any thought on one thing though; he wanted revenge...   
  
And it would be against his Master.  



End file.
